332 UMBELLIFERiE. 



ofwhich the Grocers' Company had the weighing and oversight, and 

 was classed in 1484 in the same way in the German warehouse iu 

 Venice. 



Description — The fruit, the colour of which is brown, has the usual 



structure of the order ; it is of an elongated ovoid form, tapering towards 



each end, and somewhat laterally compressed. The mericarps, which 



do not readily separate from the carpophore, are about J of an inch in 



length and y^ of an inch in greatest breadth. Each has 5 primary 



ridges which are filiform, and scabrous or muriculate, and 4 secondary 



covered with rough hairs. Between the primary ridges is a single 



elongated vitta, and 2 vittse occur on the commissural surface. A 



transverse section of the seed shows a reniform outline. There is a form 



of C. Gyminum in cultivation, the fruit of which is perfectly glabrous. 



Cumin has a strong aromatic taste and smell, far less agreeable than 

 that of caraway. 



Microscopic Structure — The hairs are rather brittle, sometimes 

 i mm. in length, formed of cells springing from the epidermis. The 

 larger consists of groups of cells, vertically or laterally combined, and 

 enclosed by a common envelope ; the smaller of but a single cell ending 

 ma rounded point. The whole pericarp is rich in tannic matter, strikin 

 with salts of iron a dark greenish colour. 



Ihe tissue of the seed is loaded with colourless drops of a fatty oil; 

 the vittte with a yellowish-brown essential oil. But the most striking 

 contents of the parenchyme of the albumen consist of transparent, 

 colourless, spherical grains, 7 to 5 mkm. in diameter, several of which 

 are enclosed m each cell. Under a high magnifying power, they show 

 a central cavity with a series of concentric layers around it, frequently 

 traversed by radial clefts. Examined in polarized light, these grams 

 display exactly the same cross as is seen in granules of starch, although 

 tiieir behaviour with chemical tests at once proves that they are by no 

 means that substance ; in fact iodine does not render them blue, but 

 intensely brown. Grains of the same character, assuming sometimes 



InT' ? ?i .' ^^^"^^ i^ "lost umbelliferous fruits, and in many 



seeas ot other orders. All these bodies are composed of albuminous and 

 latty matters; the more crystalloid form as met with in the seeds of 

 — and m the fruit of parsley, is the body called by Hartr 



0" 



o 



Ricinvs 

 A leuron. 



o 



Composition— Cumin fruits 



rif oiu • ' i'^^ ^^"^' 01 resin (M, » oi mucilage auu g""-'.- 



strnlr!'""''''''^'"^^^'''' ^^^ ^ ^^^ge amount of malates. Their peculiar, 

 strong aromatic smell and taste, depend on the essential oil of which 

 tney afford as much as 4 per cent. It contains about 56 per cent, oi 



Cuminol (or Cuminaldehyde) , C^W \ ^, a liquid of sp. gr. 0972, 



th^o3 Ifc- T- ^- ^' ^''' ^^'^ ^'^^ ^^t with, in 1858, by TrapP i^ 

 oil of Cicuta viro.sa. By boiling cuminol with potash in alcoholic 



•solution, cuminalcohol, Cm^ J CHpiI ^ ^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ ^^^^^^^^ salt of 



mm. ^ ^^ /^ r-^ *» — ^ 



cuminic 



"" I C^H^ ' ^^® formed. 



' Thomas, Fontego del Todeschi in Venezia, 1874. 2o2, 



