POISONS FROM JUNGLE PLANTS 173 



obtained from near the Batu caves at Kuala Lumpur, 

 in Selangor, were much smaller and quite globular. 

 Kirtikar and Basu give a description of the upas tree of 

 India (Antiaris toxicaria, Leschen) : "a gigantic ever- 

 green tree, with soft, white, even-grained wood, 

 attaining a height of 250 feet, fruit, like a small fig, 

 purple scarlet or crimson ; piriform, velvety, fleshy, 

 and I inch m diameter" (Ref. 15, p. 1203). The 

 botany of Antiaris toxicaria is quoted at length for the 

 same reasons given under section The Upas Climber. 

 A, innoxia, a sister tree to A. toxicaria, is the riti " 

 or *' sack tree " of Ceylon and the Moluccas from which 

 bark-cloth is made ; it has no medicinal or poisonous 

 properties. 



Few trees have been more amusing to the world than 

 Arbor toxicaria, *the ipoh or upas of Rumpbius (" Herb. 

 Ambom,,** Vol. IL, p/26B). The fables connected 

 with it were first recorded in 1783 by Foersh, a Dutch 

 doctor in the service of the Dutch East India Company. 

 Criminals condemned to die, he wrote, weretoffered the 

 chance of life if they would go to the upas tree and 

 collect some of the poison, and of those who accepted 

 the offer " only two out of twenty returned alive.'* 

 Those who were lucky enough to escape reported that 

 " they found the ground under the trees covered with 

 the bones of the dead." '* Not a tree," he added, nor 

 blade of grass is to be found in the vaOey or surrounding 

 mountains. Not a beast or bird, reptile or living thing, 

 lives in the vicinity.'* A putrid steam was supposed 

 to rise from the tree. These ridiculous tales about the 

 upas tree of Java or poison tree of Macassar have been 

 perpetuated by Darwin in his Loves of the Plants *' 

 (Ref. 7, p. 143) ^— 



Jlerce in dread silence on the blasted heath, 

 Fell Upas sits, the Hydra-Tree of death. 



