From the Bulletins we extract the following notes as especially 

 interesting to our readers here. 



On poisonous fodder plants. — Among those investigated were 

 the beans of Phastolus lunatus, commonly known as Lima beans. 

 These beans are cultivated all over the world and form an important 

 item in the food of the Brazilians. In a wild state the plant 11 pro- 

 duces seeds which vary in colour from light brown to deep purple 

 while under partial cultivation the seeds are usually light brown or 

 pink with a few purple spots and when thoroughly cultivated they 

 become much larger and the colour changes to a pale cream tint, 

 coincident with these changes of colour in the seed coat the toxi- 

 city of the seeds decreases with cultivation. In Mauritius the plant 

 is grown practicallv wild for use as a green manure. " The seeds 

 are markedlv poisonous and great care is taken to prevent cattle 

 from eating them. In India, Burmah and the Straits Settlements 

 and other Tropical countries where Phaseolm In unfits is partialis- 

 cultivated the pink or light brown seeds are commonly eaten but 

 cases of poisoning by such seeds have been recorded and attention 

 lias been called to the necessity ol using only light coloured seeds 

 and rejecting a< possibly poisonous those bearing much of the pur- 

 ple colouration. In the case of the white seeds, no cases of poison- 

 ing have been recorded. 



The poison produced by the seed is prussic acid, and this does 

 not exist as prussic acid in the seed in its ordinary state. The 

 beans contain a glucoside Phaseo-lunatin and an enzyme (un- 

 organised ferment) and when the beans are crushed and moistened 

 with water the enzyme decomposes the glucoside which breaks up 

 into glucose, acetone and prussic acid. In the very light brown 

 seeds '04 per cent, of prussic acid was found and in the deep purple 

 seeds as much as *o8 percent. 



A case of poisoning by Mauritius beans occurred in Province 

 Wellesley some years ago. These beans had been introduced for 

 green-soiling the Sugar canes and some Tamils gathered a quan- 

 tity of them as well as those of Mucitna pruriens vaf utilte and 

 made a bean-curry of them. It was noticed that the beans were 

 bitter (a fact recorded also in the Bulletin of the Imperial Institute). 

 The results were disastrous, three persons being killed. It was 

 doubtful at the time which of the two kinds of beans was the 

 poisonous one but there is now I think little doubt that it was the 

 Mauritius green-soiling bean. Thus in estates where this plant is 

 used for manuring the natives should be warned that the beans of 

 the plant are dangerous. I append Dr. FoSTOX's report on this 

 case. 



SUNGEJ BAHAT, 



Province Wellesley, 

 22nd February i iSqq. 



•Sir, — On the evening of the 19th Febrtrary, live persons were 

 attacked with symptoms of acute poisoning after eating some cooked 



