Treatise on Poisons by Sir Robert Christison

startling proposition was first advanced by M. Couerbe, and by Professor Orfila soon afterwards.[545] The latter subsequently stated, that it exists only in the bones, and not in any of the soft solids.[546] It is now clear, however, that both of these experimentalists must have committed an error. Orfila himself admits that his early researches are vitiated by the subsequent discovery of arsenic in some kinds of sulphuric acid;[547] and all recent attempts by others to obtain his results have failed. Thus MM. Flandin and Danger could not detect arsenic in any part of the human body, when it had not been administered:[548] Pfaff was unable to detect an atom of it in the bones of man or the lower animals by Orfila’s own process:[549] Dr. Rees was equally unsuccessful:[550] and in 1841 a committee of the French Institute, who superintended the performance of an analysis in three cases by Orfila, reported that he failed in every instance to find a trace of arsenic, by a process which could detect a 65th part of a grain intentionally mixed with an avoirdupois pound of bones.[551] There is the strongest possible presumption, therefore, that human bones never contain any arsenic. And besides, supposing they did, the source of fallacy would be utterly insignificant; for, when it becomes necessary to search for arsenic absorbed into the textures of the body, it is never necessary to have recourse to the bones.