198 FOOD POISONING. 



is not generally applicable is shown by the observation that where 

 this method of obtaining fish for food i^ most frequently employed, 

 no Ul results follow, and where it is not resorted to cases of fish 

 poisoning may be very common. According to Husemann, Cocculus 

 Indicus has been employed for the purpose of poisoning fish. The 

 leguminous plant Piscidia, of the West Indies, owes its name to this 

 use of its bark. In the Dutch East Indies the cortex of the root of 

 Derris elliptica and the seed of Pachyrrhinus angulatus are employed 

 for this purpose. Both of these, according to Greshof, contain a 

 non-nitrogenous substance which is highly poisonous to fish, and rela- 

 tively harmless to other animals. An extract of the derris root, 

 which, in Borneo, is also used as an arrow poison, kills fish when 

 mixed with water in the proportion of 1 : 25,000, and the active prin- 

 ciple in a dilution of 1 : 5,000,000. Greshof has isolated both of 

 these poisons and named them derrid and pachyrrhizid. A legumen, 

 Tephrosia ichthyonecea, from West Africa, also yields a non-ni- 

 trogenous poison, but this affects other animals as well as fish. The 

 fish poison of Java, from the seed of Milletia atropurpurea, contains 

 saponin, and that of Ceylon, from Hydrocarpos inebrians, owes its 

 effects to hydrocyanic acid. Kobinia nicon of tropical America is 

 used by the savage tribes for the purpose of benumbing fish and this 

 plant has been found to contain a snow-white crystalline substance, 

 freely soluble in alcohol, wholly insoluble in water. Water, to 

 which an alcoholic solution of this poison has been added in the pro- 

 portion of 1 : 1,000,000, killed fish. Other fish poisons of the West 

 Indies are Jacquinia armillaris, which, on account of the fact that its 

 dried fruit is used for bracelets is known as hois bracdet, and Ser- 

 jania letalis, from which the poisonous honey of a certain wasp is 

 prepared, the toxic action of which St. Hilaire tested upon himself. 

 * This honey, even in small quantity, is said to produce a mild intoxi- 

 cation. This will remind the classical student of the poisonous 

 honey connected with the retreat of the ten thousand Greek sol- 

 diers under Xenophon, which occurred four hundred years before 

 our era. 



4. We include in this class the cases that Blanchard would de- 

 scribe under botulism, inasmuch as the poisoning is due to putrefac- 

 tive changes. According to Anrep, there are in poisonous fish two 

 active ptomains. One of these is extracted from alkaline solution 

 with ether, chloroform and benzin. It is amorphous and insoluble 

 in water, but forms easily soluble salts of great toxicity, so that one- 

 fourth mg. of the hydrochlorid induces poisonous effects in dogs, and 

 one-half mg. kills rabbits. This ptomain may be preserved quite 

 indefinitely in the dry state or dissolved in ether, but is speedily de- 

 stroyed by strong alkalis and acids. Dissolved in phosphoric acid 

 and evaporated it gives a red coloration, rapidly passing into a dirty 

 green. Jakolew isolated a similar alkaloid from poisonous sturgeon 



