OF POISONING WITH THE ALKALINE SULPHURETS.
The liver of sulphur, or sulphuret of potass of the pharmacopœias, the
last poison of this order to be mentioned, is allied to the ammoniacal
salts in action. It is of no great consequence in a toxicological point
of view in this country, being put to little use; but several accidents
have been caused by it in France, where it is employed for manufacturing
artificial sulphureous waters; and farther, its properties should be
accurately ascertained, because till lately it was erroneously resorted
to as an antidote for some metallic poisons.
_Chemical Tests._—It has a grayish, greenish, or yellowish colour when
solid; its dust smells of sulphuretted hydrogen, which is also
copiously disengaged from it by the mineral acids: and it forms with
water a yellow solution of the same odour.—In composite fluids it may
be detected by heating it with acetic acid, and passing the disengaged
gases through solution of acetate of lead, in which a black
precipitate of sulphuret of lead is produced, from the action of
sulphuretted-hydrogen.[481]
_Action and Symptoms._—Orfila found that a solution of six drachms and a
half, secured in the stomach of a dog by a ligature on the gullet,
caused death by tetanus in seven minutes, without leaving any morbid
appearance in the body; that inferior doses caused death in the same
manner, but at a later period, and with symptoms of irritation in the
alimentary canal, which also was seen red, black, or even ulcerated
after death; that a solution of twenty-two grains injected into the
jugular vein killed a dog in two minutes, convulsions having preceded
death, and the heart being found paralysed immediately after it; and
that a drachm and a half thrust in small fragments under the skin
occasioned death in thirteen hours with coma and extensive inflammation
of the cellular tissue.[482] There can be no doubt, therefore, that
liver of sulphur is a true narcotic acrid poison.—It is absorbed, and
may be detected in the blood, liver, kidneys, and urine by Orfila’s
process.[483]
Orfila has collected three cases of poisoning in the human subject with
this substance;[484] and a fourth has been related by M. Cayol.[485] Of
these cases two proved fatal in less than fifteen minutes; and the
symptoms were acrid taste, slight vomiting, mortal faintness, and
convulsions, with an important chemical sign, the tainting of the air
with the odour of sulphuretted-hydrogen. The dose in one case was about
three drachms. The two other patients, who recovered, were for some days
dangerously ill. The symptoms were burning pain and constriction in the
throat, gullet, and stomach; frequent vomiting, at first sulphureous,
afterwards sanguinolent; purging, at first sulphureous; sulphureous
exhalations from the mouth; pulse at first quick and strong, afterwards
feeble, fluttering, and almost imperceptible; in one case sopor; finally
severe inflammation of the gullet, stomach and intestines, which abated
in three days. One of these patients took four drachms of sulphuret of
soda, the other two ounces of sulphuret of potass; but it is probable,
that the latter dose was partly decomposed by long keeping.
_Morbid Appearances._—The morbid appearances in the two fatal cases were
great lividity of the face and extremities, and exhaustion of muscular
contractility immediately after death; the stomach was red internally,
and lined with sulphur; the duodenum also red; the lungs soft, gorged
with black fluid blood, and not crepitant.
_Treatment._—The most appropriate treatment consists in the instant
administration of any diluent, then of frequent doses of the chloride of
soda, and lastly the antiphlogistic mode of subduing inflammation. The
chloride of soda or lime decomposes sulphuretted hydrogen, the
disengagement of which is the probable cause of death in the quickly
fatal cases.[486]