VEGETABLE POISONS. 339 
The materials employed by the natives for poisoning, 
or rather stupefying, fish, a custom as prevalent all over 
Polynesia as it is amongst the Indians of America, are 
the square fruit of the Vutu rakaraka (Barringtonia spe- 
ciosa, Linn.) and the stem and leaves of the Duva gaga 
(Derris uliginosa, Benth.), both plants growing in abun- 
dance on the sea-beach, just above high-water mark. As 
soon as these materials,—pounded to render them more 
efficacious,—are thrown into the water, or drawn through 
it by means of a line or creeper to which they have been 
attached, the fish turn on their back and appear on the 
surface. They are perfectly stupefied, and are thus easily 
taken; but they soon recover their lost activity, and are 
believed not to die from the effects of the treatment 
they have received. 
The nettles,—those mosquitoes of the vegetable king- 
dom, irritating but never killing as they do,—are collec- 
tively termed ‘“‘ Salato”—a name also including those ani- 
mals familiarly known as sea-nettles. There are two 
kinds. The Saloto ni coro is an annual weed (fleurya 
spicata, Gaud., var. interrupta, Wedd.), which abounds 
about towns and villages (hence the specific appellation 
of “ni coro”); and although the virulence of its sting 
is not to be compared with that of our European nettles, 
the natives so carefully avoid all contact with it, and ran 
away in such fright when I gathered specimens of it for 
the herbarium, that one is tempted to fancy their skins 
more keenly affected by it than ours. Still greater is 
their dread of an Urticaceous tree (Zaportea, sp.), forty 
to fifty feet high, which they simply term “ Salato” 
(nettle), and which, when touching the skin, produces 
Z 2 
