In the compilation of these chemical notes it has been found very difficult to be sufficiently simple and complete in explanation for non-scientific readers, without either sacrificing many important details, or exceeding the limited space available. I have attempted as far as possible not only to solve the questions that arose in the trials, but to look forward to many that might occur in future cases. No claim is laid to originality except in a few experiments; but the search through existing authorities has involved so much labour, that I must plead a very limited leisure as an excuse for any incompleteness. In such portions as touched on medicine I have been guided by the later text-books, and by living advice. It has been thought preferable to give references in the text, at the very passage quoted, instead of in foot-notes.
With regard to the proposed new Poisons Act one or two considerations should not be forgotten. There are hundreds of ways of taking life: the poisoner’s is only one. Even in his method the number of fatal agents he may use is almost unlimited. To make a schedule of certain poisons that are not to be sold without restriction, seems like prohibiting knives, while allowing stilettos—the latter are certainly less usual, but quite as fatal. Moreover, the Act of 1868 only affects one channel by which poisons may reach the public—viz., through the retail chemists. It secures a record of ordinary shop purchases, and thus facilitates the tracing of crime. But the channels of trade are still open: hundred-weights of arsenic are obtained, where ounces could not be purchased; and these large stocks are often carelessly kept, and left open to servants, workmen, or even children. The result is that the supposed restrictions on obtaining poisons are almost illusory: these substances are sown broadcast among ignorant people, and are placed in cupboards unlabelled among articles of food. The following are recent illustrations:—
“At Corkley, Wilts, the wife of a labourer used, instead of baking-powder, a packet of arsenic, intended by her husband as medicine for his horses. The husband and wife died.”—Weekly Dispatch, May 6, 1883.
“At Whitchurch, a farmer was accused of poisoning a large number of cattle and other animals with arsenic. In 1881 he had obtained several pounds of it from Liverpool, stating that he wanted it to destroy vermin.”—Evening Standard, June 2, 1883.
In the schedule of the 1868 Act, among the less dangerous poisons, to be obtained without restriction beyond proper labelling, appears, “Almonds, Essential Oil of (unless deprived of prussic acid).” Yet this preparation is one of the most perilous, as has been shown by numbers of deaths, and lately by the West Malling case (not yet ripe enough for reporting). There are also other faults in the schedule.
Remembering, then, that legislation on the sale of poisons is utterly unable to prevent poisoning, that all it can do is to make the means a little difficult, and the detection more easy, how can we approve the proposal at this moment made, to tack on a few, very tentative clauses to an unsuccessful Act, and four more names to a very defective schedule? Why insert chloride of antimony, and omit nitrate of silver, sulphate of copper, and chloride of tin? The essence of a “poison” is quantity; and no Act which does not specify the maximum quantity that may be sold, can be effective. Beyond this, why should it be more criminal to sell a dangerous substance to a poisoner than to give it to him, or by culpable negligence to allow him to take possession of it? If such neglect were made punishable, if people who left arsenic, &c., about in cupboards without precaution, had to suffer for the consequences, we should hear less of such “accidents.”
I am deeply indebted to Dr. Bernays, Professor of Chemistry at St. Thomas’s Hospital, for kind advice and facilities of consultation and experiment; to Doctors Harley, Ord, Acland, and to my namesake, Mr. Charles Stewart, F.L.S., for many valuable suggestions; and especially to Mr. E. G. Clayton, F.C.S., who contributed the main part of the chapter on Aconitia, and helped me materially in other portions of the chemical notes.
The main authorities drawn upon have been:—
Taylor’s Medical Jurisprudence, 1873.
Taylor on Poisons.
Woodman and Tidy’s Handy-Book of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, 1877.
Blyth’s Manual of Practical Chemistry, 1879.
Guy and Ferrier’s Forensic Medicine, 1881.
Allen’s Commercial Organic Analysis, 1879.
Royle’s Materia Medica, edited by Dr. J. Harley, 1876.
Christison on Poisons, 1829.
Fresenius’ Qual. and Quant. Analysis.
Watt’s Dictionary of Chemistry.
Chemical Society’s Journal.
Chemical News, Lancet, &c.
Farquharson’s Therapeutics.
Mohr’s Toxicologie, trans. by Gautier, 1876.
Casper’s Handbook of Forensic Medicine, trans. by Balfour, 1861-5.
Beilstein’s Organische Chemie, 1882.
Year Book of Pharmacy.
British and other Pharmacopœias.
Squire’s Companion.