N. ORD.-COMPOSrr =. 90 
Tribe. —SENECIONIDEA. | 
GENUS.—ERECHTHITES,* RAF, 
SEX. SYST.—SYNGENESIA SUPERFLUA,. 
ERECHTHITES. 
FIREWEED. 
SYN.—ERECHTHITES HIERACIFOLIA, PREALTA, AND BLONGATA, RAF. ; 
SENECIO HIERACIFOLIUS, LINN.; CINERARIA CANADENSIS, WALT. 
COM. NAMES.—FIREWEED; (FR.) HERBE DE FEU; (GER.) FEUERKRADT. 
A TINCTURE OF THE WHOLE PLANT ERECHTHITES HIERACIFOLIA, RAF. 
Description.—This rank, glabrous, or slightly hairy annual, usually grows 
from 1 to 7 feet high. Svem stout, erect, virgate, sulcate, and leafy to the top. 
Leaves alternate, sessile, tender, and thin, all narrowly or broadly lanceolate 
and acute; margins sharply denticulate or somewhat pinnately incised; bases of 
the upper leaves somewhat auriculate and partly clasping. /nflorescence in a loose, 
terminal, corymbose panicle ; heads about one-half inch long, cylindraceous, hetero- 
gamous, and discoid ; zxvolucre a single row of erect, linear, acute scales ; dracteoles 
few, setaceous ; flowers numerous, white, or ochroleucous, the outer female, the 
inner hermaphrodite. Corod/as all slender and tubular. Female florets: corolla-— 
tube filiform, the limb slightly dilated, and 2- 4-toothed. Hermaphrodite flowers « 
corolla-tube filiform, the limb short, cyathiform, 4- 5-lobed. Anthers tailless. Style- 
branches narrow, tipped with a conical pubescence. Receptacle flat and naked. 
Pappus white and copious ; bristles soft, fine, and elongated. Akenes oblong, 
somewhat striate, tapering at the end. 
History and Habitat.—This coarse, homely, indigenous weed ranges from 
Newfoundland and Canada southward to South America; it grows in moist, open 
woods, upon enriched soil, and blossoms in July and September. Its vulgarism, 
Fireweed, is given it on account of its seeking newly-burned fallows, there growing 
in its greatest luxuriance. : 
The whole plant is succulent, bitter, and somewhat acrid, and has been used 
by the laity principally as an emetic, alterative, cathartic, acrid tonic, and astringent, 
‘in various forms of eczema, muco-sanguineous diarrhoea, and hemorrhages. The 
oil, as well as the herb itself, has been found highly serviceable in piles and dys- 
entery. : 
In the Eclectic Dispensatory, x 
Oleum Erechthiti and Infusum Erechtian. Ph, CLA wears 
m the ancient name of some troublesome groundse 
the preparations recommended for use are: 
* Derived fro 
