No. sr. 



187 



has not yet been applied to practical use; but might 

 be equivalent to that of the officinal Euphorbium used 

 by farriers. The niilk of all the species of this genus 

 destroy Warts and cure Herpes, they may afford a 

 kind of black Varnish^ or Gum Elastic. The other 

 diseases in which these plants have been occasionally 

 employed are Dropsy, asthma, also hoo2:)ing cough and 

 fevers, but we have no great evidence of their success, 



r 



except in Asthma when they act as pectoral sudorifics. 

 The E. hijpericifolia appears to differ in its effects 

 from the two others, it is an annual, the herb being 

 employed instead of the root : it has been brought into' 

 notice by Zollickoffer, who says that it is more astrin- 

 gent and slightly narcotic ; but it is also purgative, &c. 

 After evacuations, he prescribes it in tea-spoonfuls of 

 the decoction, for Cholera infantum, diarrhea and 

 dysentery. This plant is also one of those producing 

 the salivation of horses, called Slabbering, when eaten 

 by them through chance in meadows, and the remedy 

 for which are Cabbage leaves. All our Spurges arc 

 more or less active plants, those with large perennial 

 roots are all emetic, while the annual kinds are altera- 

 tive or pernicious. One species E. peploides QE. 

 peplus Americana) is said to cause the milk fever, or 

 disease of Cows and cattle which render their milk or 

 flesh pernicious. It grows from New- York to Ten- 

 nessee, on rocks near streams. By a strange mistake 

 the capsuls of the E. lathyrus (Capper plant of New 

 England) are pickled instead of Cappers, being mis- 

 taken for the Capparis Spinosa or true Capper, and 



