The Poison of Human Saliva.

Otago Witness, Issue 1582, 18 March 1882, Page 29

The Poison of Human Saliva.

Recent observations by M. Gautier, commjunicated to the Paris Medical Academy, afford reason for believing that the poison of 'serpents differs from that of human saliva in its intensity rather than in its essential nature, so that the fears with which a human bite is often regarded may not ,be wholly unreasonable. To test this idea <M. Gautier took some 20 grammes of human saliva, and, after lixiviating and purifying, obtained a substance which, injected under the skin of a bird, in the form of a solution, produced remarkable poisonous effects. Almost immediately the bird was seized with trembling. It staggered and fell to the ground in a state of coma and complete stupor, terminated by death in half an hour or an hour, according to the dose injected and the vigor of the animal. The phenomena resembled fully those produced by the bite of a venomous serpent. The poisonous matter of the saliva is thought to be an alkaloid similar to the cadaveric poisons called potomaines, which ,MM. Brouardel and Boutmy have isolated. Like them, it produces Prussian blue when mixed with f errocynide of potasium. The facts stated throw some light on the question of virulent maladies. The present case, it is pointed out, is not that of a true virus ; for at the high temperatures a virus is destroyed, but when the salivary alkaloid is heated to more than 100 degrees its poisonous property is not affected. M. Gautier studied comparatively the poison of the cobra (one of the most formidable of Indian serpents). ' This injected, in a dose of one milligramme in a quarter of a cubic centimeter of water, under the skin of a small bird, such as a chaffinch or a sparrow, kills it in five to twelve minutes. One observes torpor and coma, then a period of excitation, with convulsions and tetanic contraction. In connection with the subject, a correspondent of La Nature calls attention to a passage of Rabelais, in which the poisonous nature of human saliva is recognised.