Page:Medical Botany-1790-1.djvu/45

 and contains a milky juice; the stalks are numerous, slender, twining, and spread themselves upon the ground, or neighbouring trees, to the extent of fifteen or twenty feet; the leaves are arrow-shaped, smooth, of a bright green colour, and (land upon long footstalks : the flowers are funnel-shaped, yellowish, plicated, and, according to Dr. Russel, placed in pairs upon the pedicles : the calyx is double, consisting of four emarginated leaflets in each row : the capsule is three and sometimes four locular, containing feeds of a pyramidical shape. No part of the dried plant possesses any medicinal quality but the root, which Dr. Russel administered in decoction, and found it to be a pleasant and mild cathartic.

It is from the milky juice of the root that we obtain the officinal Scammony, which is procured in the following manner by the peasants, who collect; it in the beginning of June : “ Having “ cleared away the earth from about the root, they cut off the top, “ in an oblique direction, about two inches below where the stalks “ spring from it. Under the most depending part of the Hope they “ fix a shell, or some other convenient receptacle, into which the “ milky juice gradually flows. It is left there about twelve hours, “ which time is sufficient for draining off the whole juice : this, “ however, is in small quantity, each root affording but a very “ few drams. I his juice from the several roots is put together, “ often into the leg of an old boot, for want of some more proper “ vessel, where in a little time it grows hard, and is the genuine “ Scammony.” This concrete is a gummy-resin, generally of a light, shining, grey colour, and friable texture. It is brought from Aleppo and Smyrna; that which comes from the latter place is less valued than the former, and is supposed to be more ponderous and of a deeper colour; but the colour affords no tell of the goodness of