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Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
strychnine
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ I brought my trick-or-treat candy to the school to check for razor blades and pins and strychnine.
▪ Striking a match in a gas-filled room, sipping a glass of vodka and strychnine, that's what I call dangerous.
▪ Whiskey with strychnine was said to produce an exceptionally crazy drunk.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Strychnine

Strychnine \Strych"nine\, n. [L. strychnos a kind of nightshade, Gr. ?: cf. F. strychnine.] (Chem.) A very poisonous alkaloid resembling brucine, obtained from various species of plants, especially from species of Loganiace[ae], as from the seeds of the St. Ignatius bean ( Strychnos Ignatia) and from nux vomica. It is obtained as a white crystalline substance, having a very bitter acrid taste, and is employed in medicine (chiefly in the form of the sulphate) as a powerful neurotic stimulant. Called also strychnia, and formerly strychnina.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
strychnine

powerful poisonous alkaloid, 1819, from French strychnine, from Modern Latin Strychnos, the genus name of the plant (nux vomica) from which the poison is obtained, from Greek strychnon, a kind of nightshade, of uncertain origin. The chemical was discovered 1818 by Pelletier and Caventou in the Asian tree Strychnos ignatii.

Wiktionary
strychnine

n. (context organic compound English) A very toxic, colourless crystalline alkaloid, derived from nux vomica, used as a pesticide

WordNet
strychnine

n. an alkaloid plant toxin extracted chiefly from nux vomica; formerly used as a stimulant

Wikipedia
Strychnine

Strychnine (; also or ) is a highly toxic, colorless, bitter crystalline alkaloid used as a pesticide, particularly for killing small vertebrates such as birds and rodents. Strychnine, when inhaled, swallowed, or absorbed through eyes or mouth, causes a poisoning which results in muscular convulsions and eventually death through asphyxia. While it has no known medicinal effects, in the past the convulsant effect was believed to be beneficial in small doses. The most common source is from the seeds of the Strychnos nux-vomica tree.

Usage examples of "strychnine".

Drosera, and quickly cause strong inflection, it seems probable that strychnine, nicotine, digitaline, and hydrocyanic acid, excite inflection by acting on elements in no way analogous to the nervecells of animals.

I spent it in ransacking the library until I discovered a medical book which gave a description of strychnine poisoning.

Inglethorp died of strychnine poisoning, presumably administered in her coffee.

Inglethorp took her coffee upstairs with her, I do not see what you expect to find, unless you consider it likely that we shall discover a packet of strychnine on the coffee tray!

Judging from the quantity recovered, she must have taken not less than three-quarters of a grain of strychnine, but probably one grain or slightly over.

She would have had to take very nearly the whole bottle to account for the amount of strychnine found at the post-mortem.

Monday evening last, did you purchase strychnine for the purpose of poisoning a dog?

Of all the household, he alone would be likely to recognize the symptoms of strychnine poisoning, and yet we find him the only member of the family to uphold strenuously the theory of death from natural causes.

Bauerstein had it tested, and you yourself laughed at the possibility of there being strychnine in it.

Or it may not have been strychnine at all, but some obscure drug no one has ever heard of, which produces much the same symptoms.

Mary, where you purchased strychnine in the name of Alfred Inglethorp?

The analyst was asked by him to report whether strychnine was, or was not, present.

Guess at her relief when strychnine is mentioned, and she discovers that after all the tragedy is not her doing.

A narcotic taken with strychnine will delay the action of the poison for some hours.

What third medium was there--a medium so suitable for disguising the taste of strychnine that it is extraordinary no one has thought of it?