From the body of a hound that, in the course of thirty-one days, took 2·789 grms. of calomel (2·368 Hg) in eighty-seven doses, about 94 per cent. of the substance was recovered on analysis:—
| Mercurous Sulphide. Grms. | ||
|---|---|---|
| In the | fæces, | 2·1175 |
| „ | urine, | 0·0550 |
| „ | brain, heart, lungs, spleen, pancreas, kidneys, scrotum, and penis, | 0·0090 |
| „ | liver, | 0·0140 |
| „ | muscles, | 0·0114 |
| 2·2069 | ||
This equals 1·9 of metallic mercury.[939] Thus, of the whole 2·2 grms. of mercuric sulphide separated, over 95 per cent. was obtained from the fæces.
[939] Riederer, in Buchner’s Neues Repert. f. Pharm., Bd. xvii. 3, 257, 1868.
This case is of considerable interest, for there are recorded in toxicological treatises a few cases of undoubted mercurial poisoning in which no poison had been detected, although there was ample evidence that it had been administered by the mouth. In such cases, it is probable that the whole length of the intestinal canal had not been examined, and the analysis failed from this cause. When (as not unfrequently happens) the mercurial poison has entered by the skin, it is evident that the most likely localities are the urine, the liver, and the kidneys.[940]
[940] A woman died from the effects of a corrosive sublimate lotion applied by a quack to a wound in her leg. The writer found no poison in the stomach, but separated a milligramme of metallic mercury from the liver; the urine and intestines were not sent.