We ascertained that the woman, in whose house were five sufferers, went away as in a gentle sleep; and that a few minutes before death, she had spoken and swallowed."[1] She died in three hours. The other fatal case was that of a dock-yard watchman, who was found dead in his box six or seven hours after he ate the muscles.
The inspection of the bodies threw no light on the nature of these singular effects. No appearance was found which could be called decidedly morbid. The stomach contained a considerable quantity of the fish half digested.
Dr. Combe's narrative agrees with that of Vancouver, four of whose sailors were violently affected, and one killed in five hours and a half, after eating muscles which they had gathered on shore in the course of his voyage of discovery.[2]
In closing this account, allusion may be briefly made to a case related by Dr. Edwards, which differs from all the preceding. The symptoms were uneasiness at stomach, followed by epileptic convulsions, which did not entirely cease for a fortnight. Dr. Edwards imputed the illness to muscles; but it must be observed that this is a solitary instance of simple convulsions arising from such a cause.[3] The case deserves particular attention, because a suspicion of intentional poison might have been excited by the circumstances in which it occurred. The individual, a young man, was attacked soon after eating in company with another, who was about to marry his mother, and with whom on that account he lived on bad terms.
Of the Source of Poison of Muscles.
Various opinions have been formed as to the cause or causes of the poisonous qualities of some muscles.
The vulgar idea that the poisonous principle is copper, with which the fish becomes impregnated from the copper bottoms of vessels, is quite untenable. Copper does not cause the symptoms described above. I analyzed some of the muscles taken from the stomach of one of Dr. Combe's patients, without being able to detect a trace of copper. Others have arrived at the same result in former cases. The only instance indeed to the contrary is a late analysis by M. Bouchardat; who does not mention the quantity of copper he detected, or what was the source of the poisonous fish.[4]
The theory which ascribes their effects to changes induced by decay is equally untenable. In Dr. Burrows's two cases the muscles appear to have been decayed; yet he very properly refuses to admit this fact as explanatory of their operation. And, indeed, it rather complicates than facilitates the explanation; as it shows that the poison differs from animal poison generally, in not being destroyed by putrefaction. Dr. Combe's inquiries must satisfy every one, that in the Leith cases decay was out of the question, and I may add my testimony to the statement: the muscles taken from the stomach of
