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FEGETABLE POISONS. 
T hough there are few countries in the world which 
abound more with deleterious vegetables than the coun» 
try adjacent to the Cape of Good Hope^ yet the principal dan¬ 
ger, to the traveller, refults from the animated part of the 
creation ; he can always avoid the one, when he cannot appre¬ 
hend the other. I am only acquainted with four of the former 
kind, which are commonly employed as inftruments of de« 
flrudlion. 
The firft is a large bulbous plant, Amaryllis Difticha, which 
is called Mad Poifon, from the effeds ufually produced on the 
. animals which are wounded by the weapons impregnated with 
it. The natives prepare this poifon in the following manner : 
They take the bulbs, about the time when they are putting out 
their leaves, and cutting them tranfverfly, extract a thick fluid, 
which is kept in the fun till it becomes quite of the conflftence 
of gum. It is then put up for ufe; and the method of laying 
it on their arrows has been already defcribed. 
The hunters employ this fj3ecies of poifon chiefly for the 
purpofe of killing fuch animals as are intended for food, fuch as 
antelopes and other fmall quadrupeds. After they are v/ounded, 
they can, and do in general, run for feverai miles; and it fre- 
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