I 882 .J 
Action of Poisons on Flowers . 
733 
IX. THE ACTION OF POISONS ON THE PETALS 
OF FLOWERS. 
By A. Anthony Nesbit, F.C.S. 
I. The Alkaloids . 
f T having come under my notice that a flower placed in 
water into which some tobacco had accidentally fallen 
faded with surprising rapidity, I resolved to make some 
experiments on the aCtion of various substances on the life 
of flowers, and for this purpose selected some of the best- 
known alkaloids, viz., strychnine, solanine, digitaline, quini- 
dine, atropine, quinine, cinchonine, picrotoxine, aconitine, 
brucine, and morphine, using J per cent and i per cent solu- 
tions. The alkaloid of tobacco being very difficult to obtain 
pure, owing to its rapid oxidation, 5 per cent and 20 per 
cent solutions of tobacco (bird’s eye) were used in its stead. 
The flower chosen for experiment was the narcissus, and 
the results showed that there was here a wide field for long 
and patient investigation. 
Of all the twelve solutions tobacco proved, in a very 
marked manner, to be most destructive to the life of the 
flower of the narcissus ; the remaining eleven poisons, 
though but slowly injurious, nevertheless in some instances 
showed marked difference of effeCt, or, it may be said, 
symptom. Thus strychnine, next in poisonous power to 
tobacco, drew the petals upwards, and made them dry and 
brittle, symptoms also exhibited by solanine poisoning, while 
quinidine and several other alkaloids rendered the petals 
limp and rotten. Morphine, one of the least poisonous (to 
the narcissus) of the alkaloids experimented with, without 
destroying the flower, curiously enough imparted to the 
petals a flaccidity resembling that of the petals of the 
poppy. 
(To be continued.) 
