TANGHIN, OR THE POISON ORDEAL OF MADAGASCAR. THOUGH ordeals by fire and water are, or have been, national judicial institu tions of world-wide distribution, recourse to a deadly poison as a legal remedy has not met with such universal recognition. With the exception of the " Red Water " ordeal of the Papuans, and the " Bitter Water " of certain Melanesian tribes, poison ordeals are strictly confined to the Dark Continent, of which the ordeal of the Calabar bean as practiced by the negroes of Old Calabar is the most popular and well-known instance. Although Livingstone, Du Chaillu, and other African explorers mention the use of certain roots for poison ordeals by Central African tribes, and Guinea natives are known to use a form of strychnos for the same purpose, we think we are justified in stating that no exact analogue of the tanghin of Madagas car can be found in any of the ordeals prac ticed elsewhere. The source of the poison — from which it also derives its name — is the " Tanghinia venenifera," a plant indigenous to Madagas car. Teacourt, governor of the French set tlement at Fort Dauphine in the seventeenth century, wrote an account of the island of Madagascar on his return to France, and in this quaint and interesting work a descrip tion of " Le Tangena" is given, which evi dently was not the modern form of the or deal, but was more akin to the Melanesian "Bitter Water," in that death never resulted from the direct action of the poison. Evi dence from various sources leads to the con clusion that the "Tanghinia venenifera" was first used for judicial purposes at the begin ning of this century, from which period it was consistently employed until the abolition of ordeal by poison in 1864 by international treaties. The tanghin tree is somewhat like a chest nut in appearance. As its foliage is of a
dark-green hue and its flower of a gorgeous crimson, it presents a very attractive sight during the months of October and Novem ber. Botanists would more accurately de scribe the tree as belonging to the order of the " Apocynaceae," and its fruit as a drupe; but as botanical names only appeal to the initiated, we will continue the description without employing them. About the middle of November, the flow ers fade, and a small green fruit appears, which rapidly increases in size until Christ mas, when the fruit attains maturity. It is then something like a large yellow egg-plum, though the skin is not of one uniform tint, but is streaked with varying tints of red and brown. The pulpy portion of the fruit is of a repulsive gray color, and possesses a correspondingly disgusting taste; and in the center of this is found the kernel, which is enclosed in a bivalve like the common al mond. The kernel is the poisonous part of the fruit, and has been found to contain a most violent poison, which is not strychnine, or, in fact, an alkaloid or nitrogenous com pound at all, but a substance which is prob ably unparalleled in the whole range of toxicological chemistry. The tanghin was reserved for the detec tion of such crimes as treason and witchcraft, or anything directly or indirectly due to the intervention of the supernatural; and as such crimes were frequent and the circle of sus picion wide, it acted as a constant drain on an already scanty population. Ellis com putes that three thousand persons perished annually under this ordeal, and a tenth of the entire population drank it in their lives — some four or five times — while, of those who drank, more than half died on the spot or from the after-effects. For minor offenses the ordeal was per formed thus : ff two parties disputed on a
