It has been supposed by some that the tubers of Solanum tuberosum, the common potato, may acquire in certain circumstances poisonous qualities of no mean energy. Dr. Kabler of Prague has described the cases of four individuals in a family who were seized with alarming narcotic symptoms after eating potatoes which had begun to germinate and shrivel. The father of the family, who had eaten least of them all, appeared as if tipsy, and soon became insensible. The mother and two children became comatose and convulsed. All had vomited before becoming insensible. They recovered under the use of ether, frictions, and coffee; and in two hours were out of danger.[1]
An alkaloid has been indicated by several chemists in various species of solanum. The most recent account, that of Otto, represents it to be a pearly, white, pulverulent substance, alkaline in reaction, and capable of uniting with acids. One grain of sulphate of solania killed a rabbit in six hours, and three grains a stronger rabbit in nine hours,—the symptoms being those of narcotic poisoning.[2]
Violent effects have often been assigned to the genus Solanum, in consequence of its similarity to a powerful poison, the Atropa belladonna; which indeed is described by the older authors under the name of Solanum furiosum. It will be noticed among the Narcotico-acrid Poisons.
CHAPTER XXIX.
OF POISONING WITH HYDROCYANIC ACID.
The poisons, whose energy depends on the presence of the prussic
or hydrocyanic acid, are of great interest to the physiologist as
well as the medical jurist. Some of them are natural productions,
derived from the leaves, bark, fruit-kernels, and roots of certain
plants; others are formed artificially by complex chemical processes.
The species to be here noticed are the hydrocyanic acid itself, and
the essential oils and distilled waters of the bitter almond, cherry-laurel,
peach-blossom, cluster-cherry, mountain-ash, and bitter cassava.
These poisons have for some time attracted great attention
on account of their extraordinary power. And indeed in rapidity
of action, or the minuteness of the quantity in which they operate,
no poison surpasses and very few equal them. They are exceedingly
interesting to the medical jurist, because, as they are now
generally known, their effects often become the subject of medico-legal
investigation: they have been repeatedly taken by accident;
they have often been resorted to for committing suicide; and they
have likewise been employed as the instruments of murder. A
remarkable instance occurred in England towards the close of last
century, where murder was committed with the cherry-laurel water;
