“I treated one case of poisoning by arsenic. Some years ago during the prevalence of cholera, I was asked to see a gentleman about seven or eight in the evening, and the account was that he had been ill since three or four in the morning. I found him labouring under premonitory symptoms of cholera, and I prescribed for him. I returned about ten, and found the symptoms very much aggravated, and the vomiting and purging still continued. His voice was not affected, and the vomiting was not the same as in cholera. It was a reddish yellowish matter, and I requested it to be set aside. I thought it was not a case of cholera, and asked him what he had taken. He said only his ordinary food, wine, &c., but nothing else. The symptoms went on still further, and I called a consultation of other medical men. He still said he had taken nothing. I was satisfied from the aggravation of the symptoms that something else was the matter, and at last he died about three in the morning. I next day learnt that he had purchased half-an-ounce of arsenic the day of his death. I had the vomit and contents of stomach analysed, and discovered arsenic in great quantities. Extreme thirst, as far as I know, is an early symptom in poisoning by arsenic—but not equally so in cholera, it belongs to a later stage in cholera.”
Dr. Douglas Maclagan, of Edinburgh, who had had some experience in arsenical poisonings, and devoted much of his time to chemistry, had the same opinion as Dr. Lawrie of the innocuousness of arsenic as a cosmetic (mainly from its insolubility).
“Unless there was some ulceration or abrasion of the skin, or it was kept long in contact with it. In warm water it would dissolve to a greater extent than in cold—in which some such proportion as only one 400th part would dissolve, and if you required to dissolve any great quantity it must, according to Dr. Taylor, be boiled violently for half-an-hour, and then it retains about 1-40th of its weight after the water cools.”
The Dean.—“Will the presence of organic matter in a fluid interfere with its solvent power upon arsenic?”
Witness.—“As a rule, it generally will. There does not appear to be any difference between tea, coffee, or water when poured upon arsenic. They dissolve but a very small quantity, I do not know how you can determine whether cocoa or chocolate is a sufficient solvent or not. You cannot filter them so as to determine the quantity. There is a great deal of organic matter in the ordinary chocolate or cocoa, it ought to be entirely organic matter, except so far as it is water.” (The Witness then gave an account of a case of a girl whom he attended, who took arsenic by accident, mistaking it for an effervescing powder.) “We all know the ordinary symptoms of arsenical poisoning. Most of them are very similar to, almost identical with, the symptoms of cholera. In the case of slight quantities of arsenic, it would appear that the symptoms very closely resemble those of what are called bilious or British cholera. In fatal cases they are more like malignant or Asiatic cholera.”
The Dean.—“Can you diagnose a case of arsenical poisoning by the symptoms?”
Witness.—“I believe you may. In the first place the vomiting would be bloody, from the violent irritation and the pouring out of a bloody mucus into the stomach—after that has been emptied of all its contents. I suppose there would be more affections of some of the mucous membranes, an unaccountable occurrence of an extensive inflammatory redness about the eyes, and the occurrence of nervous symptoms, such, for instance, as paralysis of the limbs. But these are not necessary symptoms. A person may be suffering from the effects of arsenic without these being produced if the quantity is small.”
The Dean.—“You never saw jaundice as a symptom of arsenical poisoning?”
Witness.—“I am not entitled to speak on my own experience, as I never saw it. There is a single line in Taylor’s book, which says, that it has been observed, and which refers to the remarks of Dr. Marshall on Turner’s case.” (Extract read.)
The Dean.—“Is that a description of jaundice?”