LATHYRUS SATlVUS. 



The remarkable part connected with it is its undoubted tendency to produce 

 paralysis, which has been ascribed to the nitrogenous constituents in which it is 

 exceptionally abundant. The widespread occurrence of paralysis in Sindh after a 

 season of extensive inundations, in which kasari was grown on an exceptionally large 

 scale, attracted considerable observation, and the Settlement Officer of Azamgarh reports 

 that similar effects are to be noticed in the Azamgarh District, cases of paralysis being 

 far from uncommon in villages where kasari forms an important item of diet. It may 

 also be noticed that the occurrences of some cases of paralysis in the military station of 

 Almora some few years ago was traced to the fraudulent admixture of kasari with the 

 gram supplied for the use of the troops. 



Colonel Sleeman writes as follows of the effect of the large consumption of kasari 

 in eastern villages of Oudh : — 



In 1829 the wheat and other spring crops in this and the surrounding villages were destroyed by a 

 " severe hail-storm; in 1830 they were deficient from the want of seasonable rains, and in 1831 they were 

 " destroyed by blight. During these three years the kasari which, though not sown of itself, is left carelessly 

 " to grow among the wheat and other grain, and given in the green and dry state to cattle, remained 

 " uninjured, and thrived with great luxuriance. In 1831 they reaped a rich crop of it from the blighted 

 " wheat fields, and subsisted upon its grain during that and the following year, giving the stalks and leaves 

 " only to their cattle. In 1833 the sad effects of this food began to manifest themselves. The younger 

 " part of the population of this and the surrounding villages, from the age of thirty downwards, began to 

 " be deprived of the use of their limbs below the waist by paralytic strokes, in all cases sudden, but in some 

 " more severe than in others. About half the youth of this village of both sexes became affected during 

 " the years 1833 and in 1834 ; and many of them have lost the use of their lower limbs entirely, and are 

 " unable to move. The youth of the surrounding villages, in which kasdri from the same causes formed the 

 "chief article of food during the years 1831 and 1832, have suffered in an equal degree. Since the year 

 " 1834 no new case has occurred, but no person once attacked had been found to recover the use of the 

 " limbs affected, and my tent was surrounded by great numbers of the youth in different stages of the disease, 

 " imploring my advice and assistance under this dreadful visitation. Some of them were very fine-looking 

 " young men of good caste and respectable families, and all stated that their pains and infirmities were 

 " confined entirely to the joints below the waist. They described the attack as coming on suddenly, often 

 " while the person was asleep, and without any warning symptoms whatever, and stated, that a greater 

 " portion of the young men were attacked than of the young women. It is the prevailing opinion of the 

 " natives throughout the country, that both horses and bullocks which have been much fed upon kasdri are 

 " liable to lose the use of their limbs, but if the poisonous qualities abound more in the grain than in the stalk 

 " or the leaves, man, who eats nothing but the grain, must be more liable to suffer from the use of this food 

 " than beasts, which eat it merely as they eat grass or hay." 



Explanation of Plate XXXII. 



1. Terminal portion of plant, 



2. Flower, front view, 



3. Ditto, back view, 



^ nat. size. 



4. Flower, with some of the petals removed, 



5. Pod, 



(). Ditto, with one valve removed, 



I nat. 



size. 



Drawn from a living specimen gathered at Saharanpur. 



