MISCELLANEA. 
295 
BENEVOLENT FUND. 
A meeting for the purpose of granting two annuities from this Fund of Thirty Pounds 
each took place at the House of the Society on Friday, 27th October ; Mr. Sandford, 
President, in the chair. 
Scrutineers having been appointed, and the votes examined, the Chairman, on the 
report of the Scrutineers, declared the following result:— 
David Peart. Charlotte Goldfinch. Win. J. Frooin. Thomas Novis. 
875 - 857 734. 188. 
David Peart and Charlotte Goldfinch were therefore declared to he duly elected. 
The votes polled for the unsuccessful candidates may be brought forward for four 
succeeding elections. 
MISCELLANEA. 
Accidental Poisoning !by Essential Oil of Almonds.—An inquest was held 
at Alton, on Saturday, October 7th, by Mr. Han field, deputy coroner for Hants, upon 
the body of Eliza Chevis, a girl two and a half years old. In the early part of the week 
the child had a cough, and on Wednesday evening her father went to the shop of Mr. 
Knight, a chemist in the town, for two pennyworth of sweet oil of almonds and syrup 
of violets, which he had been in the habit of giving to his children when they had a 
cold. A boy served him with something from a bottle behind the counter, and when 
the child went to bed her mother gave her a teaspoonful of the mixture. She imme¬ 
diately spat it out, and the father, suspecting something was wrong, left with the inten¬ 
tion of going to the chemist’s, but was called back, when he found the deceased gasping 
and in a fit. Dr. Curtis w r as sent for, and he found her quite insensible and only 
breathing at short intervals. He tasted the mixture, and found it to consist of oil of 
bitter almonds. In about half an hour the child died from the effects of the poison. 
Mr. Knight said the boy who served the syrup was between fifteen and sixteen years of 
age, and had been told never to make up medicines in his master’s absence, but go 
to another chemist in the neighbourhood for it. The jury returned a verdict to the 
effect that deceased died from having essential oil of almonds administered to her acci¬ 
dentally and by mistake. 
ZSxtr actum Oarnis (Liebig ).—As the demand for this article has become so general, 
and as some of our readers may not be acquainted with the process for producing it, 
we give the following from Liebig’s ‘Familiar Letters on Chemistry.’ Chopped meat, de¬ 
prived of all fat, is boiled for half an hour with eight or ten times its weight of water, 
which suffices to dissolve all the active ingredients. The decoction must, before it is eva¬ 
porated, be most carefully cleansed from all fat (which would become rancid), and the 
evaporation must be conducted in the water-bath. The extract of meat is never hard 
and brittle, but soft, and it strongly attracts moisture from the atmosphere. The boiling 
of the meat in the first instance may be carried on in clean copper vessels, but for the 
evaporation of the soup, vessels of porcelain should be used. Liebig’s process for making 
beef-tea is as follows :—Raw beef (recently killed) ^ lb., distilled water 22\ oz., common 
salt 50 grains, dilute hydrochloric acid 16 drops; macerate the beef, chopped very fine, 
in the water, etc., for an hour and half ; strain off through a fine hair-sieve; take two 
tumblers daily. 
Accidental Poisoning* by Opium.—The ‘Cambria Daily Leader’reports a case 
that is singular from the manner in which an infant came by its death at Radyr, near 
Cardiff. On Tuesday Elizabeth Lee took her daughter Elizabeth, aged twelve weeks, to 
Mr. Edwards, surgeon, Canton, to be vaccinated. Mr. Edwards said the child was very 
healthy, and begged of her to bring it in a week, that he might take the matter from 
its arm. While they were talking, Mrs. Lee informed the doctor that an old female 
patient living at Radyr was in great pain that morning. He began to make up two 
powders, and the singular part of the story is that Mrs. Lee said they must not be pur¬ 
gative, as her child’s bowels had been relaxed very much. He said, no, they would 
purify the blood, and secure healthy matter. He said she was to give her (meaning the 
old patient) one powder when she got home, and another at bedtime. About six in the 
evening Mrs. Lee gave her baby one of these powders, and in three hours it died. Mr. 
Edwards was then informed of the circumstance by the child’s father, and he said the 
