7304 Notices of New Books. 



immediate environs, during a few days' visit to the place, in April, 

 1859 ; with notes and observations. By the Rev. R. T. Lowe, M.A. 



2. On the Homologies of the so-called Univalve Shell and its 

 Operculum. By John Denis Macdonald, R.N., F.R.S. 



3. On the Occurrence of Gyrodactylus elegans on Sticklebacks in 

 the Hampstead Ponds, January, 1860. 



4. Discovery of Alpheus Edwardsii on the Coast of Cornwall. By 

 Jonathan Couch, F.L.S. 



5. On the Poisonous Effect of a small portion of the Liver of a 

 Diodon inhabiting the Seas of Southern Africa. Communicated by 

 Sir John Richardson, M.D., F.R.S. 



The case recorded of the poisonous effect of the liver of a Diodon, 

 written by Mr. Hugh Jameson, Surgeon to H.M.S. 'Winchester,' is 

 of great interest. Mr. Jameson says : — " About 12.40 p.m., on the 

 4th of September, my assistance was requested on board the Dutch 

 brig of war ' Postilion,' on account of two men who were said to have 

 been poisoned by eating part of a well-known deleterious fish com- 

 mon in Simon's Bay. I immediately repaired on board, but on 

 arriving found that both men had expired some minutes before. * * * 

 It is said to have been the liver of a single fish that was eaten : it is 

 known in Simon's Bay by the name of the toad-fish. It seems they 

 were aware, or had been warned, that the fish was poisonous, but 

 were resolved to try the experiment, the boatswain asserting that the 

 liver was not so, but rather a delicacy. This fish is from 6 to 8 

 inches long, and the liver may have weighed about 4 drachms. Din- 

 ner had been piped to at 12 o'clock, after finishing which the fatal 

 morsel was cooked : this could not have been sooner than twenty 

 minutes after 12 o'clock. At 12.45 I got on board, at which time life 

 had been extinct for some minutes ; so that the period from the 

 taking of the poison until death could not have exceeded twenty 

 minutes." Another account states the time between eating and death 

 to have been seventeen minutes. On a fost-mortem examination 

 " there was no vestige of anything like the poisonous substance that 

 had been swallowed ;" and it is also stated that the " cook who had 

 fried the liver for the others, and had eaten a small portion, exhibited 

 no alarming symptoms." 



The name of the fish is rather vaguely given in this manner :— 

 " Aplodactylus punctatus ? or Tetraodon, CuvierT 



In perusing the paper with that careful attention which so im- 

 portant a communication deserves, I cannot help thinking that suffi- 

 cient pains were not taken to establish the fact that eating the liver of 



