Word: poisonous
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...very much like a "mini" historic compromise. The Christian Democrats at week's end sought instead to force a better accord in parliament. The situation left Moro-and the country-with a grim political choice. Said one political observer darkly: "It's either the gun or slow poison...
...many adversaries shrill in the same vituperative key. Even lovers snarl their sweet nothings, as if they were pouring poison into each other's ears...
...investigation indicated that at least 18 of the victims-including nine of those who died-had been given Pavulon, or pancuronium bromide, a synthetic variant of curare, the lethal plant toxin used by South American Indians to tip poison darts. Anaesthesiologists sometimes administer Pavulon to surgical patients to relax their muscles, but hospital records showed that no doctor had prescribed its use on any of the victims...
...bemused native kings. Malaria felled the adventurers in wholesale lots. The curative properties of quinine had been known for two centuries, but the drug had been brought from Peru by Jesuits and thus was thought unfit for Protestants. At least one explorer, Richard Lander, was forced to drink poison. This ritual proved his good faith when he survived it, and he was permitted to watch human sacrifices. "The head is severed from the trunk with an ax," he wrote blandly, "and the smoking blood gurgles into a calabash...
...much less. Moral indignation, that main current of contemporary American thought, seems nonexistent. Yet Vidal's travelogue through this dark time is as funny as it is unsettling. With malicious wit, irresistible gossip and sturdy research, he turns 1876 into an ornate 200th birthday card inscribed with a poison...