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It is looked upon as an important and somewhat mysterious operation. Waterton and Schombergh describe it. The Indian, when preparing to concoct this deadly compound, goes into the wilds where grows a vine the strychnos toxifera. After this he collects a number of bundles, and then takes up a root with an especially bitter taste.
It is neither a phyllanthus, nor a coriaria, as M. Willdenouw conjectured, but, as M. Kunth's researches show, very probably a strychnos. We shall have occasion, farther on, to speak of this venomous substance, which is an important object of trade among the savages. The trees of the forest of Pimichin have the gigantic height of from eighty to a hundred and twenty feet.
Here I should explain that mwavi or mkasa, as it is sometimes called, is the liquor distilled from the inner bark of a sort of mimosa tree or sometimes from a root of the strychnos tribe, which is administered by the witch-doctors to persons accused of crime. If it makes them sick they are declared innocent.
"Morphia, cinchonia, quinia, lobelia, belladonna, narcotina, bromine, arsenicum, strychnos colubrina, brucoea ferruginea," muttered the savant, as he examined one vial after the other and replaced it. "Brucoea ferruginea ha! brucine!
They were pieces of a lliana, or creeping plant. It was the bejuco de curare, or "mavacure," as it is sometimes called. The leaves he had stripped off, and left behind as useless. Had he brought them with him, they would have been seen to be small leaves of an oblong-oval shape, sharp at the points, and of a whitish-green colour. Don Pablo knew the plant to be a species of Strychnos.
Such exceptional provisions are not without precedent in the animal oeconomy: the hornbill feeds with impunity on the deadly fruit of the strychnos; the milky juice of some species of euphorbia, which is harmless to oxen, is invariably fatal to the zebra; and the tsetse fly, the pest of South Africa, whose bite is mortal to the ox, the dog, and the horse, is harmless to man and the untamed creatures of the forest.
Its principal ingredient is derived from the Strychnos toxifera tree, which yields also the drug nux vomica." A great light dawned on me. I turned quickly to where Vanderdyke was sitting next to Mrs. Ralston, and a little behind her. His stony stare and laboured breathing told me that he had read the purport of Kennedy's actions. "For God's sake, Craig," I gasped. "An emetic, quick Vanderdyke."
The poison, which must be fresh to kill speedily, is obtained only of the Indians who live beyond the cataracts of the rivers flowing from the north, especially the Rio Negro and the Japura. Its principal ingredient is the wood of the Strychnos toxifera, a tree which does not grow in the humid forests of the river plains.
Strychnos potatorum, whose berries are used to purify water, forms a dense foliaged tree, 30 to 60 feet high, some individuals pale yellow, others deep green, both in apparent health. One of my carts was here hopelessly broken down; advancing on the spokes instead of the tire of the wheels.
Leslie and I looked at Kennedy, and the horror of the thing sank deep into our minds. Woorali. What was it? "Woorali, or curare," explained Craig slowly, "is the well-known poison with which the South American Indians of the upper Orinoco tip their arrows. Its principal ingredient is derived from the Strychnos toxifera tree, which yields also the drug nux vomica, which you, Dr.
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