43^ POISONS : THEIR EFFECTS AND DETECTION [§§ 53 O, 53 I. 
that the fungus imparts an intoxicating quality to that secretion, which 
continues for a considerable time after taking it. For instance, a man 
moderately intoxicated one day will, by the next morning, have slept 
himself sober, but (as is the custom) by taking a teacup of his urine 
he will be more powerfully intoxicated than he was the preceding day. 
It is, therefore, not uncommon for confirmed drunkards to preserve their 
urine as a precious liquor against a scarcity of the fungus. The intoxi¬ 
cating property of the urine is capable of being propagated ; for every¬ 
one who partakes of it has his urine similarly affected. Thus, with a 
very few amanitas, a party of drunkards may keep up their debauch 
for a week. Dr Langsdorf mentions that by means of the second person 
taking the urine of the first, the third of the second, and so on, the 
intoxication may be propagated through five individuals.” 1 
§ 530. A few cases of poisoning by the fly-blown agaric from time to 
time have occurred in Europe, where it has been eaten in mistake for the 
edible fungi, or taken by children allured by the bright, attractive colours. 
In these cases the poisonous symptoms noticed have been those of 
gastro-intestinal irritation, as shown by vomiting and diarrhoea, dilated 2 
pupils, delirium, tetanic convulsions, slow pulse, stertorous breathing, col¬ 
lapse, and death. In a few cases epileptic attacks and trismus have been 
observed. The course is usually a rapid one, the death occurring within 
twelve hours. In cases of recovery, convalescence has been prolonged. 
The post-mortem characteristics are not distinctive ; a fluid condition 
of the blood, hypersemia of the brain, liver, and kidneys have been noticed. 
§ 531. Muscarine. —These effects are partly due to an undiscovered 
toxic substance—which seems- to be destroyed at the temperature of 
boiling water, and is probably of rather easy destructibility—and to a 
very definite poisonous alkaloid ( muscarine ) first separated by a complex 
process by Schmiedeberg and Koppe in 1869. 3 It is a trimethyl- 
ammonium base. Fischer has prepared a base very similar to, but not 
identical with, muscarine ; the base on oxidation yielded betaine. 
Schmiedeberg and Harnack, 4 by oxidation of choline with nitric 
acid, obtained a base also very similar to, but not identical with, natural 
muscarine :— 
CH 2 - CH 2 - OH CH 2 - CH(OH), 
(CH 3 ) 3 = N<( +0-*(CH 3 ) 3 = N/ 
OH x OH 
Choline. Muscarine (?) 
The true constitution of muscarine has not yet been determined. 
1 Lindley’s Vegetable Kingdom. 
2 This is the more curious, for muscarine strongly contracts the pupil. It, how¬ 
ever, tends to prove what is stated in the text—viz. that there is more than one 
poisonous substance in Amanita. 
3 Das Muscarin, das giftige Alkaloid des Fliegenpilzes. Leipzig, 1869. 
4 Arch. f. exper. Path., Bd. iv. u. v. 
