o neutralize to a greater or less extent
the effect of the poisonous one. Under its influence, when present in
quantity, the poison is almost entirely neutralized. Contraction of the
pupils changes to dilation, and slowing of the pulse may disappear. Only
through the presence of this natural antidote in the Fly mushroom, says
Kobert, is it possible, as in some parts of France and Russia, to eat
without danger this mushroom, which contains 10% of sugar (trehalose or
mycose) in a fermented and unfermented condition. He states also that
delirium, intoxication, and other symptoms which, according to Prof.
Dittmer of Kamschatka and various scientific travellers, are reported
effects of the Fly mushroom in the extreme north, are not experienced in
the same degree in southern Russia. This difference in action, he
thinks, may be very properly attributed to the varying proportion of the
above-mentioned atropin in the mushroom or to the presence of substances
which develop only in the extreme north.

The symptoms of _muscarin_ poisoning, apart from vomiting and purging,
are slowing of the pulse, cerebral disturbance, contraction of the
pupils, salivation and sweating. In case of death, which is caused by
suffocation or a suspension of heart action, the lungs are found to be
filled with air, and there is a transfusion of blood in the alimentary
canal.

Prof. R. Kobert, in a lecture delivered before the University of Dorpat
in 1891, states that _muscarin_ is found equally in the Fly mushroom (A.
muscaria), the Panther mushroom (A. pantherinus), Boletus luridus, and
in varying quantities in Russula emetica. He states also that though
highly poisonous to vertebrates, _muscarin_ is not so to flies, and that
the noxious principle in A. muscaria which kills the flies is not as yet
determined.

It has been shown that the lower animals, such as sheep and geese, as
well as man, have been severely poisoned by feeding on the "Fly
mushroom," and that in the case of the horse, experiments have
demonstrated that even 0.04 of a gramme, 0.62 of a grain, have caused
marked symptoms of poisoning.

For _muscarin_ as for _neurin_ poisoning the antidote is atropin
administered internally or by subcutaneous injection.

PHALLIN.

The toxic alkaloid of Amanita _phalloides_ Fries (Amanita _bulbosa_) was
examined by Boudier, who named it "_bulbosin_," and by Ore, who named it
"_phalloidin_," but their examinations, it is claimed, proved little
be