'I 



s 



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of the fynonyma introduced above, are not In this refped fo correa^ 

 applicable as they ought to be.' The Syrian Plums were much 

 efteemed by the ancients, particularly a fpecies which grew in th 

 neighbourhood of Damafcus,'' and hence a variety of this fruit is ftili 

 known by the name of Pruna damafcena. According to Pliny 'th 



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was brought from Syria into Greece, and from thence into Italy 

 where its fruit is repeatedly noticed by the Latin poet/ " 



All our garden plums are eaten at table, and when fufficiently ripe 

 and taken in a moderate quantity, prove a pleafant and v/holefome 

 food. But in an immature ftate, they are more liable to produce 

 colicky pains, diarrhoea, or cholera, than any other fruit of this clafs* 

 fome attention to this circumflance is therefore always neceffary. 

 Confidered medicinally, they are emollient, cooling, and laxative 

 efpecially the French prunes, which are imported here in their dried 

 Hate from Marfeilles ; -and though the laxative power of thefe is di- 

 niiniihed by drying, yet it is obferved by Dr. Cullen, that as they 

 contain a great deal of the acid which they originally had, they have 



effed: in this way than the other dried fruits.^ They are found 

 to be peculiarly ufeful in coftive habits, and are frequently ordered ia 

 decodion with fenna or other purgatives. It is the pulp of this fruit 

 which is direded in the Eleduarium e Senna, or Lenitive eleduary. 



L 

 \ 



«=_ On this fubjea Profefibr Murray fays, " Hifce Pharmacopoeia Londinenfi duce in- 



telligo vulgaria ifta oblonga, profunde violacea, ubivis in hortis reperiunda, cui varietati 



lion audeo inbrevitate defcriptionum adfcribere nomen Rauhinianum velTournefortianum, 



Jiifi fit Pruna oblonga ccerulea C. B. vel Pr. frudu oblongo coeruleo Tournef." App. 

 Med. vol, iii, p. 230. ' 





See Diofcorides, (Lib. i. cap. i. 174J by whom the tree is called Koxxi^/^'jAj*, and 



-the fruit KoxKvi/.n'hx, 



Hl^f. Nat. L. xv'. cap. 13 



.^ It is alfo thus mentioned by Ovid : 



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Prunaque, non folum nigro liventia fucco, 

 Verum etiam generofa, novafqu'e imitantia ceras. 



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^ Mat. Med vol l. p. 254. 



Met. Lib, xiii. -y. 81? 



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ASARUM EUROPiEUM 



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