CIMICIFUGA.

white flowers disposed in a long raceme.

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The RHIZOME and

ROOTLETS are the parts employed. The rhizome is a rugged, blackish-brown caudex, from a third of an inch to an inch in thickness, often several inches in length, furnished with numerous slender rootlets. Internally its colour is whitish; it has a peculiar faint, disagreeable odour and a bitter, somewhat astringent, taste. It imparts its virtues to boiling water, and contains a crystalline principle, gum, starch, two resins, tannic and gallic acids, and a volatile oil. The active principle has not yet been isolated.

Effects and Uses.-The effects of cimicifuga are not very accurately known. After large doses, vertigo, dilated pupil, and often hypnotic and anodyne effects are seen. On the circulation its effects are similar to, but less powerful than, those of digitalis, as it slows the cardiac beat, while increasing the strength of its contraction, and raises the arterial tension. It is undoubtedly an active stimulant of the secretions, particularly those of the skin, mucous membranes and kidneys. It acts also on the uterus and unstriped muscles like ergot, but less powerfully. It increases the sexual appetite of the male and promotes the menstrual flow of the female. It has been employed with advantage as an expectorant in chronic bronchial affections, and even in caseous pneumonia and phthisis. In fatty heart it is safer than digitalis, and may be used in dilated heart, languid circulation, and oppressed breathing. It has also been used as a diaphoretic in rheumatism and as a diuretic in dropsies. Puerperal mania, hypochondriasis and convulsions, due to menstrual irregularities, have been cured by cimicifuga" (Bartholow). As an antispasmodic in chorea it enjoys a high reputation. It often gives relief in the congestive forms of dysmenorrhea, and was formerly occasionally employed to promote the expulsion of the placenta after delivery, but all such practices are being superseded by manual expression of the placenta. In the relief of after-pains, and in menorrhagia it is frequently of service. It is a good remedy in subinvolution of the uterus. Á saturated alcoholic solution has been used, with good effect, as an application to the eye in ophthalmia.

Administration.-Dose, in powder, gr. xx-3j. Of the fluid extract or tincture the dose is f3ss-j or ij.

DEPRESSO-MOTORS.

CONIUM.

Conium maculatum, or Hemlock (Nat. Ord. Umbellifera), is a biennial European plant, naturalized in many parts of the United States. Its stem is erect, from three to five feet high.

FIG. 18.

The leaves are large and bright green; the flowers are small, white, and arranged in umbels. The whole plant is narcotic and virulent, and has a fetid, heavy odour. The FULL-GROWN FRUIT (gathered while yet green, and carefully dried) is the only portion used. It has a yellowish-gray colour, a feeble odour, and a bitterish taste; it is roundish-ovate, a line and a half in length by a line in breadth, and striated.

The active principle of hemlock is an alkaloid termed conine (CHN), which exists in larger proportion in the seeds than in

the leaves. It is a colourless, transparent, volatile, oily fluid, of a peculiar repulsive, suffocating, mouse-like odour and a bitterish taste, sparingly soluble in water, and freely so in alcohol, ether, and chloroform, and undergoes decomposition upon exposure to the air. It is a highly energetic poison, even in very small doses; the dose of it is gr. 7. Another alkaloid, conhydrine (CH1NO), has been isolated; both probably exist as malates. Conine combines with acids to form salts and with water a hydrate. A new principle, methylconine (C,H,CH,N), has been obtained.

Physiological Effects.-Local action: conine applied to a part may produce paralysis. Nervous system: hemlock has but little influence upon the cerebral hemispheres, for in cases of poisoning from it, consciousness has been preserved to the last. A medicinal dose induces the following effects: a sense of muscular fatigue and feebleness of the legs is felt, the eyelids droop, and vision becomes impaired, accompanied by dilatation of the pupil. In lethal doses conium causes paralysis, which is due to a paralyzing influence on the terminal extremities of the motor nerves. On the sensory nerves it has no influence, while its action on the cord is doubtful. The circulation is not influenced by hemlock; the respiratory movements are not altered unless a poisonous dose has been taken, when the respiratory centre is paralyzed and death ensues from asphyxia. Temperature: some lowering of the animal heat has been noted; but this, lately, has been denied by Lautenbach. Secretions: conium has no action on the glandular organs. Elimination: hemlock is eliminated in part by the urine, as it has been found there. In large doses it causes nausea, vertigo, dimness of vision, relaxation of the muscles; and in poisonous quantities, dilatation of the pupils, difficulty of speech, delirium or coma, paralysis, and finally convulsions and death. It has no direct hypnotic effect. Like woorara, its characteristic physiological effect is the production of pure motor paralysis, beginning in the extremities and extending to the trunk, involving chiefly the terminal nerve-endings. In cases of poisoning, alcoholic stimuli are to be given,

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and as physiological antidotes, the tetanizing agents, as strychnine.

Medicinal Uses.-It is employed as a general and topical anodyne, to relieve the pain of malignant tumours; and, even if destitute of the deobstruent powers which have been ascribed to it, it certainly exerts a remarkably palliative influence upon painful chronic indurations. It has also been recommended as an antispasmodic in whooping-cough, asthma, paralysis agitans, and as an anodyne in neuralgia; as an adjuvant to other remedies in mania, and especially in melancholia; to moderate irritability of the sexual organs; in diabetes; to relieve the blepharospasm of many acute inflammations of the eye; and it is used externally as a cataplasm to cancerous and other irritable ulcers. Conium is quickly absorbed, and is eliminated with equal rapidity; hence its effects are speedily induced, and are of brief duration. It is the cicuta of Hippocrates, Galen, and Pliny, and is supposed to have been the poison administered to Socrates and Phocion.

Administration.-The dose of the powder, gr. ss-j. The extract (alcoholic) may be given in the same doses. An abstract is also officinal; dose, gr. 4-j. A tincture (dose, f3ss, f3j) and a fluid extract are also used; of the fluid extract, in preparing which hydrochloric acid is employed to fix the alkaloid conine, the dose is miv-v, gradually increased until some effect is obtained.

The preparations of conium are uncertain, from the fact that the active principle is very volatile and easily escapes. Probably the best preparation is the fluid extract.

PHYSOSTIGMA.

Physostigma or Calabar Bean is the SEED of Physostigma venenosum (Nat. Ord. Leguminosa), a perennial climbing plant of the western coast of Africa. The seed is about the size of a large horse-bean, irregularly kidney-form in shape, with hard, brittle integument, and of a dark chocolate-brown colour. The inner kernel is by far the more active portion. Alcohol, but not water, extracts its medicinal virtues. It yields an active alka

loid, termed eserine or physostigmine (C15H21N,O2), sparingly soluble in water, but more soluble in alcohol, ether and chloroform; and recently another alkaloid, termed calabarine, which is believed to be a tetanizing agent, has been found in it in variable amount.

The Calabar bean has long been used among the negroes of western Africa as an ordeal to determine the guilt or innocence of accused individuals, whence its name, the ordeal bean of Calabar.

Physiological Effects.-It has been found, in full medicinal doses, to produce giddiness, torpor, paleness and coolness of the surface, weak and irregular pulse, relaxation of the muscular system, and drowsiness, but not stupor. An interesting effect of its action is a remarkable power of contracting the pupil, whether taken internally or applied externally; it seems probable that this is accomplished by a local peripheral action—i. e., paralysis of the sympathetic terminals and stimulation of the oculo-motor fibres in the iris; and it also contracts the ciliary muscle, which regulates the accommodating power of the eye. Nervous system: the brain is not directly affected by Calabar bean, the paralysis induced by it being due to a depressant action upon the spinal cord. In proof of this statement can be offered the fact that the muscular contractility and irritability of the motor and sensibility of the sensory nerves remains unimpaired in cases of poisoning by physostigma. The local application of a strong solution abolishes the functions of both kinds of nerves (Fraser). Lethal doses of physostigma cause total loss of reflex activity in the cord. Circulation: small doses of physostigma retard the heart's action by lengthening the diastolic pause, while toxic doses arrest it in diastole, but before the movements are extinguished there is a marked fall in blood pressure. The stoppage is probably due to paralysis of the cardiac ganglia. Respiration toxic doses of physostigma cause slowing of these movements, and eventually they are abolished, death ensuing from asphyxia. Intestines: Calabar bean increases decidedly intestinal peristalsis. Increase of the salivary secretion has been observed. A poisonous dose of physostigma in man causes nausea, giddiness, muscular weakness and tremors, diminished