N. ORD.—CRUCIFERZ, 5 
Tribe.—LEPIDINEAZ AND THLASPIDEA. 
GENUS.—CAPSELLA,* VENT. 
SEX, SYST.—TETRADYNAMIA, 
BURSA-PASTORIS; 
SHEPHERDS PURSE. 
SYN.—CAPSELLA BURSA-PASTORIS, MG@IN.; THLASPI BURSA-PASTORIS, 
LINN. 
COM. NAMES.—SHEPHERD’S PURSE; (FR.) BOURSE DE PASTEUR; (GER.) 
HIRTENTASCHLEIN. 
A TINCTURE OF THE WHOLE PLANT CAPSELLA BURSA-PASTORIS, MCEN. 
Description.—This intrusive little annual grows to a height of from 6 to 18 
inches. oot tap-shaped. Séem erect, simple, or branching at the summit, smooth 
or sometimes pubescent. Leaves mostly rosulate at the root, pinnatifid or pinna- 
tifidly toothed; stem “eaves sessile and partly clasping, more or less sagittate, 
toothed or in some cases entire, especially those at the base of the racemes. 
Inflorescence apparently a dense cluster at the summit of the stem, but as fruiting 
advances showing a racemose arrangement; flowers minute, white; Aedice/s long, 
especially in fruit. Sefa/s ovate, long-pointed, and having inserted about their 
middle a filamentous appendage. /eéa/s spatulate. Anthers sagittate. Style short; 
stigma capitate. Sv/icle obcordate triangular, flattened contrary to the septum; 
valves 2, scaphoid, wingless, Seeds numerous; cotyledons plane, incumbent. Read 
description of Cruciferze under Sinapis alba, 23. 
History and Habitat.—This European immigrant has become too thoroughly 
a nuisance as a weed about the cultivated lands of this country from Florida north- 
ward and westward, where it flowers from earliest spring to September. 
This plant was formerly classed with the genus Thlaspi, from which it was 
removed on account of its wingless valves. 
The Shepherd's Purse has been used in English domestic practice from early 
times, as an astringent in diarrhoea; it was much used in decoction with milk to 
check active purgings in calves. Later its value here was much doubted, and 
other properties accorded it, especially those of a stimulating astringent and 
diuretic. It has been employed in fresh decoction in hematuria, hemorrhoids, 
diarrhoea and dysentery, and locally as a vulnerary in ecchymosis and as an appli- 
cation in rheumatic affections. The juice on cotton, inserted in the nostrils, was 
often used to check hemorrhage in epistaxis. 
* From capsula, a pod. : ae . ae ms 
+ I use the specific name, which should always distinguish this plant in medicine, to ee 
