Description and analysis of Spurred Rye.—The spur varies in length from a few lines to two inches, and is from two to four lines in thickness. If it is long, there is seldom more than one or two on a single ear, and the remaining pickles of the ear are healthy. But the ears which have small spurs have generally several, sometimes even twenty; and when there are many, few of the remaining pickles are altogether without blackness at the tips.[[2464]] The substance of the spur is of a pale grayish-red tint; and externally it is bluish-black or violet, with two, sometimes three, streaks of dotted gray. It is specifically lighter than water, while sound rye is specifically heavier, so that they are easily separated from one another.[[2465]] It is tough and flexible when fresh, brittle and easily pulverized when dry. The powder is disposed to attract moisture. It has a disagreeable heavy smell, a nauseous, slightly acrid taste, and imparts its taste and smell both to water and alcohol. Bread which contains it is defective in firmness, liable to become moist, and cracks and crumbles soon after being taken from the oven.[[2466]]—It is easily known, when entire, by its external characters. Its powder, which is of an obscure grayish-red hue, is best known by the action of solution of potash, which immediately disengages a powerful odour of ergot, and forms a lake-red pulp; and this pulp yields by filtration a splendid lake-red solution, which gives a beautiful lake-red flaky precipitate, when either neutralized by nitric acid, or treated with an excess of solution of alum.
Spurred rye has been repeatedly subjected to analysis. The earlier researches of Vauquelin[[2467]] and of Pettenkofer[[2468]] do not lead to any pointed results. The presence of hydrocyanic acid indicated by Robert,[[2469]] would not account for the very peculiar effects of ergot, and has besides been denied by Wiggers. Winkler obtained various principles from it, and among the rest a thick, rancid, slightly acrid oil, and a nauseous, sweetish, acrid fluid; but he did not determine, any more than his predecessors, in which of these principles the active properties of the spur reside.[[2470]] Wiggers supplied more definite information on the subject. He denies the presence of hydrocyanic acid, and says he found ergot to consist chiefly of a heavy-smelling fixed oil, fungin, albumen, osmazome, waxy matter, and an extractive substance of a strong, peculiar taste and smell, in which, from experiments on animals, he was led to infer that its active properties reside. I have obtained all his chief results, except the most important of them; for the substance which ought to have been his ergotin was destitute of marked taste or smell of any kind.[[2471]] Dr. Wright too could not obtain the ergotin of Wiggers, and concludes from his own experiments, that the spur consists of fungin, modified starch, mucilage, gluten, osmazome, colouring matter, various salts, and thirty-one per cent. of fixed oil, in which the active properties of the poison seemed to him to reside.[[2472]] Buchner, however, thinks that the oil is not itself active, but owes its apparent energy to an acrid principle which alcohol removes from it, and which is not removed from the crude substance in separating the oil in the usual way by sulphuric ether, unless the ether be somewhat alcoholized.[[2473]] However this may be, it seems ascertained by the experiments of Dr. Wright, that the fixed oil, obtained by means of common ether, concentrates in itself the peculiar properties possessed by ergot, either in small doses as a medicine, or in a single large dose as a poison.
Effects of Spurred Rye on Man and Animals.—Before proceeding to relate the effects of this poison on man, it should be mentioned, that at different times doubts have been entertained, whether the baneful effects ascribed to it might not really arise from some other cause. But independently of the connexion which has been frequently traced between the poison and the diseases imputed to it in the human subject, the question has been set at rest by the experiments which have been tried on animals, and which indeed were instituted with a view to settle the point in dispute.
The experiments hitherto made on animals are variable in their results, yet sufficient to show that spurred rye is an active poison of a very peculiar kind. According to the observations collected by Dr. Robert from a variety of authors, it follows that it is injurious and even fatal to all animals which are fed for a sufficient length of time with a moderate proportion of it, unless they escape its action by early vomiting; that dogs and cats, in consequence of discharging it by vomiting, suffer only slight symptoms of irritant poisoning;—but that swine, moles, geese, ducks, fowls, quails, sparrows, as well as leeches and flies, are sooner or later killed by it;—and that the symptoms it causes in beasts and birds are in the first instance giddiness, dilated pupil, and palsy, and afterwards diarrhœa, suppurating tumours, scattered gangrene throughout the body, and sometimes dropping off of the toes. Wiggers ascertained that nine grains of the substance he has considered its active principle occasioned in a fowl dulness, apparent suffering, gradually increasing feebleness, coldness and insensibility of the extremities, and in three days a fit of convulsions, ending in death.[[2474]] Taddei lately found, that sparrows were killed by six grains of it in six or seven hours, with symptoms merely of great weakness, torpor, and indisposition to stir.[[2475]]
Dr. Wright, whose experiments are the most extensive and precise yet made on this subject, found that a single dose, consisting of a strong infusion of between two drachms and a half and six drachms of ergot, if introduced into the jugular vein of a dog, occasions death, sometimes in a few minutes, sometimes not for more than two hours, with symptoms of alternating spasm and paralysis, occasionally a tendency to coma, and often depressed or irregular action of the heart, or even complete arrestment of its function;—that, when introduced into the cellular tissue, it produces inflammation and suppuration, sometimes circumscribed, sometimes diffuse, and always attended with an unhealthy discharge and great exhaustion;—and that, when admitted into the stomach, it excites irritation of the alimentary canal, excessive muscular prostration, at first excitability, but afterwards singular dulness or even complete obliteration of the senses, and occasional slight spasms; but that it is not a very active poison through this channel, as above three ounces are required to prove fatal to a dog. When it was administered in frequent small doses, he could not observe the effects remarked by Robert, but found that it induced a peculiar cachectic state, indicated by extreme muscular emaciation and weakness, loss of appetite, frequency of the pulse, repulsive fetor of the secretions and excretions, congestion of the alimentary mucous membrane, excessive contraction of the spleen, enlargement of the liver and absorbent glands, and non-formation of callus at the ends of fractured bones.[[2476]]
With regard to its effects on man, it has been found by express experiment, that a single dose of two drachms excites giddiness, headache, flushed face, pain and spasms in the stomach, nausea, and vomiting, colic, purging, and a sense of weariness and weight in the limbs.[[2477]] But it is not in this way that it has been usually introduced into the system; nor are these precisely the symptoms already hinted at as particular in its action. The effects now to be mentioned form a peculiar disease, which has often prevailed epidemically in different territories on the continent, and which arises from the spur being allowed to mix with the grain in the meal, and being taken as food for a continuance of time in rye-bread. The affection produced differs much in different epidemics and even in different cases of the same epidemic. Two distinct disorders have been noticed; the one a nervous disease, characterized by violent spasmodic convulsions; the other a depraved state of the constitution, which ends in that remarkable disorder, dry gangrene; and it does not appear that the two affections are apt to be blended together in the same case.
The first form of disease, the convulsive ergotism of the French writers, has been very well described by Taube, a German physician, as it occurred in the north of Germany in 1770–1. In its most acute form, it commenced suddenly with dimness of sight, giddiness and loss of sensibility, followed soon by dreadful cramps and convulsions of the whole body, risus sardonicus, yellowness of the countenance, excessive thirst, excruciating pains in the limbs and chest, and a small, often imperceptible pulse. Such cases usually proved fatal in twenty-four or forty-eight hours. In the milder cases the convulsions came on in paroxysms, were preceded for some days by weakness and weight of the limbs, and a strange feeling as of insects crawling over the legs, arms, and face; in the intervals between the fits the appetite was voracious, the pulse natural, the excretions regular; and the disease either terminated in recovery, with scattered suppurations, cutaneous eruptions, anasarca or diarrhœa, or it proved in the end fatal amidst prolonged sopor and convulsions.[[2478]] Another more recent and very clear account of this form of the disease has been given by Dr. Wagner of Schlieben from his experience of an epidemic which prevailed in the neighbourhood of that place so lately as the years 1831 and 1832. In consequence of unusual moisture and late frosts in the summer of 1831, the rye was so much spurred in many fields that a fifth at least of the pickles was diseased. As soon as the country people proceeded to use the new rye, convulsive ergotism began to show itself, and it recurred more or less till next midsummer, when the diseased grain was all consumed. The usual symptoms were at first periodic weariness, afterwards an uneasy sense of contraction in the hands and feet, and at length violent and permanent contraction of the flexor muscles of the arms, legs, feet, hands, fingers and toes, with frequent attacks of a sense of burning or creeping on the skin. These were the essential symptoms; but a great variety of accessory nervous affections occasionally presented themselves. There was seldom any disturbance of the mind, except in some of the fatal cases, where epileptic convulsions and coma preceded death. Every case was cured by emetics, laxatives, and frequent small doses of opium, provided it was taken in reasonable time, and the unwholesome food was completely withdrawn.[[2479]]
The other form of disease, which has been named gangrenous ergotism, by the French writers, and is known in Germany by the vulgar name of creeping-sickness (kriebelkrankheit), has been minutely described by various authors. In the most severe form, as it appeared in Switzerland in 1709 and 1716, it commenced, according to Lang, a physician of Lucerne, with general weakness, weariness, and a feeling as of insects creeping over the skin; when these symptoms had lasted some days or weeks, the extremities became cold, white, stiff, benumbed, and at length so insensible that deep incisions were not felt; then excruciating pains in the limbs supervened, along with fever, headache, and sometimes bleeding from the nose; finally the affected parts, and in the first instance the fingers and arms, afterwards the toes and legs, shrivelled, dried up, and dropped off by the joints. A healthy granulation succeeded; but the powers of life were frequently exhausted before that stage was reached. The appetite, as in the convulsive form of the disease, continued voracious throughout.[[2480]] In milder cases, as it prevailed at different times in France, nausea and vomiting attended the precursory symptoms, and the gangrenous affection was accompanied with dark vesications.[[2481]] In another variety, which has been witnessed in various parts of Germany, the chief symptoms were spasmodic contraction of the limbs at first, and afterwards weakness of mind, voracity and dyspepsia, which, if not followed by recovery, as generally happened, either terminated in fatuity or in fatal gangrene.[[2482]]
These extraordinary and formidable distempers were first referred to the operation of spurred rye in 1597 by the Marburg Medical Faculty, who witnessed the ravages of the poison in Hessia during the preceding year. Since then repeated epidemics have broken out in Germany, Bohemia, Holstein, Denmark, Sweden, Lombardy, Switzerland, and France.[[2483]] About the close of last century, partly in consequence of the attention of the respective governments being turned to the subject, partly by reason of the improved condition of the peasantry in these countries, and the greater rarity of seasons of famine, the epidemics became much less common or extensive. Nevertheless the creeping-sickness has been several times noticed in Germany since the present century began.[[2484]]
Spurred rye is now generally believed to possess another singular quality, in consequence of which it has been lately introduced into the materia medica of this and other countries,—a power of promoting the contractions of the gravid uterus. This property seems to have been long familiar to the quacks and midwives of Germany; and towards the close of last century it rendered ergot so favourite a remedy with them, that several of the German states prohibited the use of it by severe statutes.[[2485]] It was first fairly brought under the notice of regular accoucheurs by the physicians of the United States between the years 1807 and 1814.[[2486]] There appears little reason for doubting that it possesses the power of increasing the contractions of the uterus when unnaturally languid; and consequently it has been employed, apparently with frequent good effect, to hasten languid natural labour, to promote the separation of the placenta, and to quicken the contraction of the womb after delivery. These facts, however, are mentioned chiefly as preparatory to the statement, that it has been also supposed to possess the power of producing abortion, and has been actually employed for that purpose in some foreign countries, and even in this city. Accurate information is still much wanted on this subject. No other poison seems so likely to possess a peculiar property of the kind. Nevertheless it is the opinion of the best authorities, that spurred rye has no such power, except in connexion with violent constitutional injury produced by dangerous doses; and that it is endowed with the property only of accelerating natural labour, not of inducing it, particularly in the early months of pregnancy.