THE OLD POISON-LORE. 
5 
The poisons known to the Asiatics were arsenic, aconite, opium, and 
various solanaceous plants. There has been a myth floating through 
the ages that a poison exists which will slay a long time after its intro¬ 
duction. All modern authors have treated the matter as an exaggerated 
legend, but, for my own part, I see no reason why it should not, in 
reality, be founded on fact. There is little doubt that the Asiatic 
poisoners were well acquainted with the infectious qualities of certain 
fevers and malignant diseases. Now, these very malignant diseases 
answer precisely to the description of a poison which has no immediate 
effects. Plant smallpox in the body of a man, and for a whole fortnight 
he walks about, well and hearty. Clothe a person with a garment 
soaked in typhus, and the same thing occurs—for many days there will 
be no sign of failure. Again, the gipsies, speaking a tongue which is 
essentially a deformed prakrit, and therefore Indian in origin, have long 
possessed a knowledge of the properties of the curious “ mucor phyco¬ 
rny ces” This was considered an alga by Agaron, but Berkeley referred 
it to the fungi. The gipsies are said to have administered the spores 
of this fungus in warm water. In this way they rapidly attach themselves 
to the mucous membrane of the throat, all the symptoms of a phthisis 
follow, and death takes place in from two to three weeks. Mr Berkeley 
informed me that he has seen specimens growing on broth which had 
been rejected from the stomach, and that it develops in enormous quan¬ 
tities on oil-casks and walls impregnated with grease. The filaments are 
long, from 12 to 18 inches, and it is capable of very rapid development. 
There is also a modern poison which, in certain doses, dooms the 
unfortunate individual to a terrible malady, simulating, to a considerable 
extent, natural disease—that is phosphorus. This poison was, however, 
unknown until some time in the eleventh century, when Alchid Becher, 
blindly experimenting on the distillation of urine and carbon, obtained 
his “ escarboucle” and passed away without knowing the importance of 
his discovery, which, like so many others, had to be rediscovered at a 
later period. 
§ 5. The Hebrews were acquainted with certain poisons, the exact 
nature of which is not quite clear. The words “ rosch ” and “ chema ” 
seem to be used occasionally as generic terms for poison, and sometimes 
to mean a specific thing ; “ rosch,” especially, is used to signify some 
poisonous parasitic plant. They knew yellow arsenic under the name of 
“ sam,” aconite under the name of “ boschJca,” and possibly “ son ” means 
ergot. 1 In the later period of their history, when they were dispersed 
through various nations, they would naturally acquire the knowledge of 
those nations, without losing their own. 
§ 6. The part that poison has played in history is considerable. 
The pharmaceutical knowledge of the ancients is more graphically and 
1 R. J. Wunderbar, Biblisch-talmudische Medicin. Leipzig, 1850-G0. 
