Note 134 — Chapter XV
Reading edition
Urarí is mentioned by Raleigh. Humboldt was the first to take any considerable quantity to Europe. The experiments of Virchau and Münster make it probable that it does not belong to the class of tetanic poisons, but that its particular effect is to take away the power of voluntary muscular movement, while the involuntary functions of the heart and intestines still continue. See Ann. de Chim. et de Phys., t. xxxix., 1828, p. 24; and Schömberg's Reisen in Britisch Guiana, th. i., s. 441. The frightful poison, tieuté of India, is prepared from a Java species of strychnos.