What do you feel ?" "The muscles are as hard as a board," I answered.
"Quite so.

They are in a state of extreme contraction, far exceeding the usual rigor mortis.

Coupled with this distortion of the face, this Hippocratic smile, or 'risus sardonicus,' as the old writers called it, what conclusion would it suggest to your mind ?" "Death from some powerful vegetable alkaloid," I answered,--"some strychnine-like substance which would produce tetanus." "That was the idea which occurred to me the instant I saw the drawn muscles of the face.

On getting into the room I at once looked for the means by which the poison had entered the system.

As you saw, I discovered a thorn which had been driven or shot with no great force into the scalp.