POISONS FROM ANIMAL KINGDOM 135 



the harmfulness to a poison gland in connexion with 

 their sharp-toothed Ungual ribbon (radula), Skeat 

 refers to a Malay tradition connected with a small air- 

 breathing land-snail (? Alyctens — Cyclophoridse) found 

 on hmestone liills in Perak, which is supposed to suck 

 the blood of cattle through the medium of the grazing 

 animal's shadow {Selangor Journal, 1892-97, Vol. IIL, 

 No. 6, p. 91). 



WOEMS 



BRISTLE WORMS 



Ulai Bulu Laui (Chloia llava — Annelida), a poly- 

 chaetous free-swimming annelid sometimes met with on 

 sandy beaches, is the only marine worm used as a poison 

 in Kelantan, It is stout and broad, from 4 to 5 inches in 

 length, and nearly 2 inches in cii-cumference^ somewhat 

 erroneously described as similar to the " sea-mouse " 

 {Aphrodite aculeata) of British shores. The bristles are 

 irritant, and are much dreaded by Malay fishermen on 

 account of the serious wounds they cause by contact. 

 To the naked eye the setse look like small black prickles 

 arranged in two rows along the whole length of the 

 dorsal surface of the worm ; they support the lateral 

 appendages (parapodia), which are also armed with two 

 additional clusters of arrow-shaped bristles to each 

 appendage. Under the microscope the bristles appear 

 to be in Httle tufts of very fine bro^n pointed filaments. 

 The bristles are said to be used as an internal poison 

 when combined ^vith other reputed gastro-intestinal 

 irritants^ especially the needle crystals of half-rotted 

 rengut fruit, the gap of jitong (one of the ringas trees 

 described in Chapter Vlll), and pounded glass. Late 

 in 1919 the Kelantan police sent a brown powder for 

 examination ; it had been found on a bad character 



