542 DETECTION OF ARSENIC IN CASES OF POISONING. 
test, the reaction with sulphide of hydrogen is applied, 
particular care must be taken that the heat applied is only 
just sufficient to effect the formation of sulphides of the 
arsenic or antimony ; for when, by the application of too 
high a temperature, sulphur is liberated and mixed with the 
metallic sulphide, the indications furnished become fallacious. 
Thus, on the one hand, sulphide of antimony may be so 
affected by an admixture of sulphur as to resemble in colour 
sulphide of arsenic, and to remain undissolved by hydrochloric 
acid gas ; while, on the other hand, sulphide of arsenic may, 
from the same circumstance, be only partially dissolved by 
ammonia. 
With regard to the customary limitation of the search for 
arsenic, in cases of suspected poisoning, to the stomach 
and its contents, Buchner is of opinion that it is insufficient 
to justify an opinion when negative results are obtained. In 
one instance he found that though arsenic was present in the 
stomach and duodenum only in such amount as to be barely 
recognisable, still, when different parts of the intestinal canal 
were examined, arsenic was found without difficulty. The 
lower portion of the intestine contained a tolerable quantity 
of slimy substance, coloured yellow by bile ; and here the 
arsenic was found in largest amount ; while in the upper 
portion of the intestine, which was empty like the stomach, 
the amount of arsenic was smaller. The author considers it 
not improbable that in this instance arsenic had been 
absorbed and excreted by the liver into the intestine. — Phar- 
maceutical Journal . 
[The statement in the last paragraph, as to where arsenic 
may be found after death, does not accord with the investi- 
gations made by the French veterinary surgeons on the horse, 
who experimented very largely with this agent. 
We have already, in a previous number, alluded to the 
effects observed by them, when animals have been poisoned 
by this agent ; but we may be allowed here to repeat, that 
they have found that however serious the lesions of the 
large intestines may be, chemical analysis with extreme diffi- 
culty, renders manifest any portion of the poison : but the contents 
of the stomach usually yield it readily. The truth is, that 
even as yet but little is known respecting the remote influence 
of this poison. The inflammatory action excited by it has 
not been thought sufficient to account for death. There is 
one fact that militates strongly against its being so, which is 
that when this agent has been applied to a wound, death is 
caused with even more certainty than when it is taken 
into the stomach, and yet the local irritation may be com- 
