58 ARUM TRIPHYLLUM. 
asthmatic affections. As topical stimulants, they 
promise to be useful when any method shall have 
been discovered of fixing and preserving their ac- 
rimony. The late Dr. Barton of Philadelphia ob- 
serves, that “the recent root of this plant boiled 
in milk, so as to communicate to the milk a strong 
impregnation of the peculiar acrimony of the plant, 
has been advantageously employed in cases of 
consumption of the lungs.” This statement how- 
ever should be qualified by the recollection, that 
the Arum imparts none of its acrimony to milk 
upon boiling, An impression of this kind can 
only have been received from a partial mixture of 
the substance of the root with the milk. 
The root contains a large proportion of very 
pure white fecula, resembling the finest arrow 
root or starch. To procure this, the fresh root 
should be reduced to a pulp, and placed ona 
strainer, Repeated portions of cold water should 
then be poured on it, which in passing through 
the strainer carry with them the farinaceous part, 
leaving the fibrous portion behind. The fecula 
thus obtained, loses its acrimony on being thor- 
oughly dried, and forms a very white, delicate and 
nutritive substance. Dr. M’Call of Georgia found 
these roots to yield one fourth part of their weight 
of pure amylaceous matter.—It is not uncommon 
