158 



Corregponticnce* 



To the Editor of the " Technologist." 



Sir, — The article in your first number, on " A Good, Wholesome, and 

 Cheap Substitute for Coffee," recalled to my mind some trials I made many 

 years ago in respect to the analogous properties of plants, or parts of plants. 

 Thus, knowing that the seed of the true coffee (Coffcea Ardbica) consisted 

 chiefly of horny albumen, I reasoned that any other horny albumen, 

 similarly treated, would, as far as flavour was concerned, resemble coffee. 

 I proceeded to test this notioD, by procuring the berries of the Ruscus 

 aculeatus, or Butcher's broom. These when roasted so closely resembled 

 coffee, that a West India merchant to whom I submitted them, begged me 

 not to make it known, as it might injure the demand for the real coffee. 

 This plant is abundant in many places, more in the southern than northern 

 counties, especially the New Forest. If the children of the poor were 

 employed to collect them, and their parents to roast them, a good and 

 wholesome beverage would be obtained. As provisions are sure to be dear 

 this winter, this hint may be appropriate. Butcher's broom is used as a 

 substitute for coffee in Corsica : so this is no novelty. The ignorance of 

 our peasantry loses them many a luxury, as, for example, the Agaricus 

 procerus and Cantliarellus cebarius. — E am, yours truly, 



Robert Dickson, M.D., F.L.S. 



Ruscus aculeatas (Butcher's broom) occurs in the following counties, 

 according to C. Watson's "New Botanist's Guide:" — Cornwall: Lemoure 

 Cove and St. Martin's Isle, Scilly. Devon : Harford Wood, near Sid- 

 mouth ; Cliffs at Marychurch ; Cockington Wood. Hants : Near Ports- 

 mouth : near Gosport ; New Forest, abundant. Sussex : Sparingly in 

 West Sussex ; abundant near Hastings. Cambridgeshire : Anglesey Abbey. 

 Kent : Tunbridge Wells and elsewhere. Surrey : Claygate Common ; 

 Coulsdon. Oxfordshire : Caversham. Yorkshire : near Ripon. Durham : 

 near Cockerton. Nottinghamshire : Cliff Wood. Scotland : Ayrshire ; 

 Lanarkshire. In Middlesex abundantly, according to Daniel Cooper's 

 " Flora Metropolitana." 



<Eeimixrs, 



On the Presence of Arsenic and Antimony in the Sources and Beds of Streams and Rivers. 



By Dugald Campbell. 

 This is a reprint of a paper from the Philosophical Magazine, in which Mr. Campbell 

 states, as the result of numberless experiments, that he has not yet met with a sand 

 from the source or bed of a stream or river that does not contain arsenic, and, perhaps, 

 antimony also ; and, indeed, considers that there are few sands that will not be found 

 to contain these metals. 



On the Action of Hard Waters upon Lead. By W. Lauder Lindsay, M.D. 

 This paper of Dr. Lindsay is chiefly directed to the rationale of the non-action of 



