enough, and vomiting has not already begun, emetics may be given; and if vomiting has begun, it is to be encouraged. Oleaginous and demulcent injections into the bladder generally receive the strangury. The warm bath is a useful auxiliary. Leeches and bloodletting are required, according as the degree and stage of the inflammation may seem to indicate.
Many other insects besides the Cantharis vesicatoria possess similar acrid properties. Two of them, however, may be briefly alluded to, because they have caused fatal poisoning. The one is the Meloë proscarabæus, the Maiwurm of the Germans, a native of most European countries. In Rust's Magazin there is an account of four persons who took the powder of this insect from a quack for spasms in the stomach. The principal symptoms were stifling and vomiting; and two of the people died within twenty-four hours.[1] The other is the Bombyx, of which at least two species are believed to possess powerful irritant properties, the B. pityocarpa and B. processionea. The following is an instance of their effects. A child ten years old had a common blister applied to the neck and spine as a remedy for deafness; and four days afterwards her mother dressed the abraded skin with the leaves of beet-root, from which she had previously shaken a great number of caterpillars. The child soon complained of insupportable itching and burning in the part, and endeavoured to tear off the dressings. The mother persevered, however; and her child died in two days of gangrene of the whole integuments of the back. The surgeon who saw the child on the last day of her life, ascribed the gangrene to the insects mentioned above, and states that they possess the power of exciting erysipelas when applied even to the sound skin.[2] It is probable that many other insects in Europe have similar properties. The Mylabris cichorii, which is partially used in Italy,[3] and is in common use in India and China for blistering, possesses active irritant properties. The Cantharis ruficollis, another species used in the Nizam's Territories in India, is also energetic. Other species known to possess activity are Mylabris fusselini, Meloe majalis, M. trianthemum, Coccinella bipunctata C. septem-punctata, and Cantharis vittata.
CHAPTER XXII.
OF THE DELETERIOUS EFFECTS OF POISONOUS FISH.
The species of fish which act deleteriously, either always or in
particular circumstances, have also been commonly arranged in the
present order of poisons.
The subject of fish-poison is one of the most singular in the whole range of toxicology, and none is at present veiled in so great obscurity. It is well ascertained that some species of fish, particu-*
