Pills of the [antimony] became popular as a medicine in the 1700s, especially as a laxative, able to blast through the most compacted bowels. It was so good the chronically constipated would root through their excrement to retrieve the pill and reuse it later. Some lucky families passed down antimony laxatives from generation to generation.
Sam Kean, blogging the periodic table over at Salon. Oh what I wouldn’t give for the simpler days of yore when we really cared about families and knew what mattered. Specifically, sifting our shit for Papa’s prize poison pill. You can just taste the love.
Lemkin 