[ 8 ° ] / 
the bottle had burfl, and the pieces of glafs had 
fcratched or cut me. But luckily that did not hap- 
pen ; and I foon refumed courage ; when, after fome 
minutes, I found myfelf quite as w r ell as before the 
explofion of the poifon, the effect of which is almoft 
inftantaneous j and it gave me no other trouble than 
to wafh and dry myfelf very carefully. 
From this accident I learned, that this poifon, thus 
prepared, ought not to be put into glafs bottles clofe 
flopped, but fhould rather be kept in a glazed earthen 
pot, covered with paper only ; fince it was fufeepti- 
ble of fo great an effervefcence. Wherefore I put it 
into a gallypot ; and the experiments, which I made 
with this fame poifon a good while afterward, con- 
vinced me, that there is no realon to apprehend, that 
it would lofe any of its activity by evaporation. 
Thefe two facts plainly fhew, how much precau- 
tion ought to be taken, when this poifon is to be 
ufed. And we fhall be the better convinced of it, 
when we confider, that one fingle drop, conveyed 
directly into the blood by a puncture, &c. is fome- 
times fuffieient to kill, or at lcafl to caufe great dif- 
turbance in the animal oeconomy. It is quite other- 
wife, when taken in at the mouth ; for then it 
does no fort of mifehief, as I fhall prove in another 
place. 
Let us now pafs to the experiments, which I have 
repeated a number of times on different fpecies of 
quadrupeds, birds, fifhes, infefts, and reptiles. But 
I mufl firfl obferve, that, of all thofe animals, none 
but quadrupeds and birds were killed by this poi- 
fon, as will more particularly appear by the journal 
