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ARSENICAL POISONING.
The Chinese are acquainted with the ter-oxide or arsenious acid pak-sun-shok; realgar, the red or bi-sulphide hung-wong; orpiment, the yellow or ter-sulphide tsz-wong ;
and & mineral known as hung-sun, which appears to be a mixture of the oxides and sulphides. Specimens of these compounds, apparently natural minerals, will be found on the table. I am also able to lay before you specimens of orpiment and realgar from Indian sources.
The year 1857-during the administration of Sir John Bowring-is a memorable one in the history of this colony on account of the whole sale poisoning by arsenic that was effected. The Press of that period unfortunately contain but meagre accounts of this gross outrage. The main facts of the case, so far as I have been able to glean them from printed records and from the statements of Europeans who were in or near the colony at that time, are that early in the morning of the 15th of January a large number of residents were taken ill soon after eating bread supplied by the Chi- nese baker A Lum, that the symptoms displayed were those of arsenical poisoning, and that not a single case terminated fatally. I have heard doubts expressed as to whether this was really a case of poisoning by arsenic. At this distant date direct confirmatory proof in the shape of a chemical analysis of the bread is, it is to be feared, out of the question. It may be as well to state that instances of wholesale or mass poisoning by arsenic are not unknown in the West. Taylor quotes a case in which 340 children at an industrial school near London were so poisoned in 1857. The quantity of arsenic taken by each child was estimated to be about one grain. The whole of the children re- covered.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
Old residents with whom I have discussed the A Lum case declare that there was never any doubt at the time as to arsenic being the poison used; and that the opinion was generally held that A Lum in his anxiety to rid the colony of the foreign element used too much arsenic, which, acting promptly as an emetic, accounted for the non-fatal termination of any of the gases. Now arsenic is a very heavy and only slightly soluble salt. It had either been mixed in powdered form with the flour or dissolved in the water used to prepare the dough. The probabilities are that the latter course was the one adopted. Had the poison in the form of powder been received into the stomach it is in- conceivable that all who partook of the bread would have escaped with their lives.
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My predecessor, Mr. Hugh McCallum, quotes a case in which a native doctor was charged administering a noxious drug." The liquid forwarded by the police was found to contain in solution the equivalent of 90 grains
of arsenious acid.
In 1894 a bowl of curried fowl was analyzed at the request of the principal Army Medical Officer and found to contain 84.38 grains of orpiment. The curry had been prepared for one of the Lascar Artillerymen. Again last year a similar case was investigated; this time from the Hongkong Regiment. A small quantity of food, less than one ounce, was found to have been mixed with 33 grains of the same compound. There were no Police Court proceedings in either of Whether the incorporation of the orpiment in the food was due to accident or de- sign in uncertain. There is nothing remark able in the fact of the Indian soldiers having this poisonous compound in their posses sion, as they are in the habit of using it as a depilatory. Chevers in his Medical Jurispru- dence for India" quotes several cases of death from the administration of orpiment.
these cases.
ACONITE POISONING.
In September, 1894, a case of poisoning by aconite was the subject of an investigation in the Police Court. The vehicle for the administra- tion of the poison was a decoction of coffee served in the usual way at a tiffin party of some members of the foreign community. The case fell to the ground through lack of evidence. In the small quantity of the beverage submitted for analysis, aconitine, the active principle of monks-hood, was detected in considerable quantity; and the escape from death of those to whom it had been served can only be attributed to the post- prandial habit of sipping the liquid instead of swallowing a large quantity at a single gulp.
It appears that the tingling sensation on the tongue, characteristic of aconite, was noted immediately after the coffee had been tasted and suspicions having been aroused the re- mainder of the beverage was rejected. It is to be regretted that the criminal was not tracked down in this case. Poisoning by aconite is quite another thing to drugging by datura, and death has frequently resulted therefrom. This is, I believe, the first case of aconite poisoning in the criminal annals of Hongkong and the use of this powerful drug by the Chinese for an unlawful purpose is of interest to the toxicologist in that it adds another to the many points of similarity between the agents used in criminal poisoning in India and in South China. It will be remembered that the active principle of aconite was the substance employed by Dr. Lamson, the Wimble don poisoner.
The specimens of aconite root on the table were purchased at native drug shops in this city. Locally the root is known as "ts o-u." I am unable to state with any degree of certainty from which of the eight species of Aconitum. recognized by the new authorities as indigenous to China, they have been derived.
CELSEMIUM ELEGANS.
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This interesting plant furnishes a drug which has on several occasions been used with deadly effect by the Chinese criminal. The root, which is the only part of the plant used, coutains an alkaloid belonging to the strychnine or tetanus group. It is one of the most powerful.poisons derived from the vegetable kingdon. In the native drug shops the dried root is found under the name "ú mun keung." In South Chins the plant is commonly termed tün ch'eung ts'ó." It is a wood twiner, growing very sparingly on this island, but more abundantly on the neighbouring mainland of China. The botanical characters of the whole plant are well set forth in the coloured plate the work of a Chinese artist-on the table. Three well authenticated cases of death from the administration of this poison have occurred in Hongkong during the last twentyfive years. Dr. C. J. Wharry records a case early in 1874 in which a native doctor was charged with manslaughter for having with fatal effect administered a decoction of the root to a shopman aged about thirty years. It appeared from the evidence that the deceased ate a hearty breakfast at 10 a.m., took the decoction at about 3.30 p.m., became giddy, with dimness of sight, loss of power in limbs, irregular breathing, and died in about two hours.
AC
[April 15, 1896.
furnishes a clue that may enable him from the very outset to concentrate his attention on the poison that was actually the cause of death. In such instances the police may possibly be able to follow up the cluo and tracé the source of supply of the drug; but in the absence of restrictions on the sale of poison used for criminal purposes-the alkaloid mor- phine alone excepted-I am not very sanguine as to their chance of success in this direction. Death rapidly follows the administration of this poison. There is no instance of a recovery on record. The victims in the 1884 case were dead when they were brought to the Civil Hospital.
The active principle of the root of Gelsemium elegans has not as yet been fully investigated. It is, however, an alkaloid possessing such marked chemical and physiological characters that it can be detected with certainty in cases of poisoning.
DATURA DATURA POISONING.
The solanaceous plant furnishing the drug known by the Chinese in Hongkong and South China as nau young fa" is the thorn apple; the Datura alba of Nees. The dried flower, iu bundles of various sizes, is the only part of the plant sold by the native druggists. The fresh entire herb may frequently be seen on the her. balist's stall. The dried flowers weigh on an average four grains each. The plaut is common in waste places near villages both here and ou the mainland and also on the neighbouring islands. I am able to exhibit specimens of the dried flowers and also a coloured plate showing the characters of the plant in flower and in fruit. This species differs from the Datura stramonium of Europe in having larg, r white flowers, brown seeds, and a less thorny capsule splitting irregularly. The seeds of the latter
are black.
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For many years previous to the appointment of an analyst to the Colonial Goverment in 1879, the plant nau yeung fa had been known to Police Magistrates in Hongkong as furnishing material in use by robbers to drug their victims; but, although frequently brought to notice in the law courts, there is no evidence to warrant the assumption that prior to 1882 it had been identified with the Datura alba.
In the official medical records of Hongkong, the first mention of datura is made by Mr. McCallum in the analytical section of the Colonial Surgeon's annual report for 1882. Some
years ago Mr. McCallum, formerly Government analyst, gave me a few notes of the investigations made by him which led up to In January, 1884, a case of alleged murder- the discovery that a solanaceous plant and the victims being a Chinese engineer and his possibly Datura alba was a common stupefying daughter was the subject of a prolonged inves. agent amongst the Chinese in Hongkong. He tigation by the coroner. A verdict of wilful states that during the years 1880-1882 cases of murder was returned by the jury, with the re- alleged drugging were frequently before the sult that the engineer's wife was charged with courts and nearly always connected with the crime at the Magistracy and subsequently robbery, the victims being in most cases re- committed for trial at the Supreme Court. The turned emigrants. An impression seems to have case, however, fell to the ground through lack pervaded the minds of the Magistrates and of evidence. It was in the course of my inves- the police that the complainants were either tigation in this case that the active principle of drunk from alcohol, or that the cases had tün cheung ts'ó" was first isolated and chemi- simply been trumped up by some evil-disposed cally and physiologically studied! The second person for the sake of revenge. In June or case within my experience occurred on the 26th July, 1882, a Chinese female child was brought November last, the victim being a Chinese late one evening to the Civil Hospital by the female 18 years of age, residing with her parents, police in a narcotised condition. The girl had at 32, Temple Street, Yaumati. This case has been stolen, and was found by the police in a not been dealt with in any of the Courts at pre-junk about to leave the harbour. When roused sent, the efforts of Inspector Witchell to sift the child was most vicious, and the temper the facts having unfortunately been frustrated displayed by her pointed to madness. by the members of the girl's family removing pupils of both pyes were widely dilated. Left into Chinese territory immediately after an
alone the child soon fell asleep, and next morn- investigation had been instituted. The girl ing, beyond displaying great stupidity, was was found dead by the inspector at 3.45 p.m. quite well. The pupils were still dilated. It was alleged that she had had a quarrel with her parents the previous evening and again at 10 o'clock the following morning. At 2 pm.stupefying drug, an extract of which acted as a the father returned and found his daughter suffering from the effects of poison. According to his statement the girl confessed that she had taken the poison in question and pointed out the pot in which she had boiled the drug. The sudden disappearance of the family certainly does not support this allegation. For the present the case can only be regarded as a very mysterious one.
I would invite the attention of any police officers who may be present to the characters of the root discovered by Inspector Witchell in this case. The production of such an exhibit is of immense value to the analyst in that it
The
Mr. McCallum then proceeded to examine a bundle of flowers reputed by the Chinese as a powerful mydriatic, both when administered internally and when applied locally to the eye. Some of the extract was given to a small mon- key, and the effects produced by it were similar p to those observed in the little girl. The flowers were submitted to the Director of the Botanic Gardens and identified as those of Datura alba.
Shortly after this, and while the datura in- vestigation was still being conducted in the Government laboratory, a second instance of mydriatic poisoning was brought to the notice of the Civil Medical authorities. Mr. McCallum's note of this case runs as follows A Chinese barber in good health, but old and anemic,
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