148 A COMPENDIUM OF 
with small dots. The flowers are large and 
showy, with five petals, which are either red or 
yellow in color, having a double calyx, stamens 
polyandrous (many) with filaments united (mo- 
nodelphous) and style divided with three to five 
stigmas ; capsule oval or pointed with from three 
to five cells, each cell containing from three to 
seven seeds of a dark-brown color and ovate in 
shape. For further account see United States 
Dispensatory. The bark of the root, as it oc- 
curs in commerce, is in thin bands or quilled 
pieces of a yellow-brown color externally ; pre- 
senting to the eye a number of circular dots and 
a perfect network of ridges; the inner surface is 
of a lighter color and of a. silky lustre, very 
finely striated; taste, bitter, astringent and ac- 
rid. The cotton bark contains tannin, sugar, 
starch, resin, and a fixed oil. The resin turns 
red on exposure and passes from a soluble to an 
insoluble condition. Its medical properties are 
emmenagogue and oxytocic, and it is used in 
form of decoction and fluid extract. Dose of the 
decoction, one fluid ounce; of the extract, 30 to 
_ 60 drops (2 to 4 grams). The material taken 
from the capsule or boll, when ripe, consists of 
fine filaments or tubular hairs flattened, which, 
On becoming dry, are distinguished from the 
linen fibres by not being tapering at the ends. 
© many uses of cotton fibre are too well known 
to need a very accurate description; suffice it to 
Say, that by the action of sulphuric acid the fibre 
38 converted into gun cotton (pyroxylin), a very 
explosive substance, which dissolves in ether 
and forms the officinal collodion of the stores. 
The cotton is also used as an absorbent in hu- 
