Note 242 — Chapter IX
Reading edition
This length of talon probably suggested to elder travellers the idea of a poison-globule stuck under the nail of the little finger, which was gradually protruded into the calabash or drinking-cup, when the venom instantly dissolved. Captain Phillips was told by a caboceer of Whydah, whom he had “well warmed with brandy and other strong liquors (here the key of most secrets),” that it was brought from a distant inland country, and that three to four slaves was the price of a single fatal dose. But brandy has the power of heating the imagination as well as the other faculties.