a fire which is made with this wood, without soon feeling its bad effects, for the face, the hands, and fre- 
quently the whole body, swells excessively, and is affected with very acute pain. Sometimes blisters arise in 
great quantity, and make the sick person look as if he were infected with the leprosy. In some persons the 
external skin or cuticle peels off in a few days, as is the case when any person has burnt or scalded any part 
of his body. Nay, the nature of some persons will not allow them to approach the place where the tree 
grows, or to expose themselves to the wind when it carries the effluvia or exhalations of this tree with it, 
without letting them feel the inconvenience of the swelling which I have just now described. Their eyes are 
shut up for one or two days together by the swelling. I know two brothers, one of whom could, without 
danger, handle the tree in what manner he pleased, whereas the other could not come near it without swell- 
ing. A person sometimes does not know that he has touched this poisonous plant, or that he has been near 
it, before his face and hands show it by the swelling. I have known some old people who were much more 
affected by this tree than a viper ; and I was acquainted with a person who, merely by the noxious exhala- 
tions of it, was swelled to such a degree that he was stiff as a log of wood, and could only be turned about 
in sheets. 
“ I have tried experiments of every kind with the poison-tree on myself. I have spread its juice upon 
my hands — cut and broke its branches — peeled off its bark, and rubbed my hands with it — smelt it — carried 
pieces of it in my bare hands, and repeated all this frequently without feeling the baneful effects so com- 
monly annexed to it ; but I, however, once experienced that the poison of the Sumach was not entirely 
without effect upon me. On a hot day in summer, when I was in some degree of perspiration, I cut a 
branch of the tree, and carried it in my hand for about half an hour together, and smelt at it now and then. 
I felt no effects from it in the evening, but next morning I awoke with a violent itching of the eye-lids and 
the parts thereabouts. It ceased after I had washed my eyes for awhile with cold water, but my eye-lids 
were very stiff all that day. At night the itching returned, and in the morning when I awoke I felt it as ill 
as the morning before, and I used the same remedy against it. However it continued almost for a whole 
week together, and my eyes were very red, and my eyelids with difficulty recovered during that time.” 
The Professor adds that he never had heard that the effects of the tree were more lasting than a few 
days. In some places the tree is destroyed, that it may not injure those who are obliged to labour near it. 
This Sumach, whose pernicious influence was indeed scarcely exaggerated by the accounts of the Upas- 
tree, is a native of Pennsylvania, New Carolina, and some other places both of the eastern and western 
hemispheres, and is described as a tall and beautiful tree. 
The fragrance of flowers is a source of continual delight to all accustomed to seek their enjoyment in 
the open air, either of the field or the garden. It affords surely as plain a manifestation of the goodness of 
God towards us as may be evinced by any indication of the usefulness of plants ; since it proves that it is 
the design of God that life should not only be supported, but enjoyed. James Montgomery has beautifully 
said that “ Flowers are in the book of Nature what the words e God is love 5 are in that of Revelation.” Yet 
the poisonous effluvia that I have mentioned as proceeding from some plants, and the offensive scents 
emitted by others, may at first sight appear to be at variance with my remarks on the benevolence by which 
the usual operations of nature are directed. 
With regard to the poisonous influence diffused on the air, I may remark that it is evidently designed 
as a warning that we may not eat the plant ; that the poison itself is in many instances very useful in medi- 
cine, when judiciously administered ; and that in many cases, where it appears to render no service to man, 
it his owing to his ignorance of the purposes to which it might be applied. Many new and interesting dis- 
coveries are daily occurring which should convince us, that in the application of poisons there is yet much 
for the investigations of other days to reveal. 
The scent of the carrion plants may, as Sir James Smith observes, be agreeable to the Hottentots, in 
whose country they abound ; and you will not consider this surmise improbable, when you remember that 
to the Chinese a dish of rotten eggs, however revolting to our tastes, offers a dainty repast. Even where it 
is impossible to account for fetid odours by these means, we must consider that they are so placed as that it 
is in our power to avoid them ; and that they do not, like the various sweet plants with which our earth is 
covered, meet us at every step of our country walk. Above all, we must never forget that this world is not 
in the state in which it came out from the hand of God, when, having looked upon all the works which he 
had made, he pronounced them “ very good.” There were no poisons in the Garden of Eden, for death or 
sickness would never have entered there ; and it was not until God had cursed the earth for man’s trans- 
gression that it bore briers and thorns. Beautiful and pleasant to the eye and ear as is nature, even yet, — 
retaining much to win our love and admiration of its beneficent Author, — it yet bears the traces of man’s 
disobedience and consequent punishment. 
