‘ HEMLOCK 185 
wind, and are when ripe but slightly attached, so that a gust of wind 
blows them away, or they are dispersed by a jerk from passing animals. 
Hemlock is a sand-loving plant, growing in sand soil, or the allu- 
vium with some humus of a stream or river. 
It is attacked by two microscopic fungi, Puccznta bullata and 
Plasmopora nivea. 
The moths the Sword-grass (Calocampa exoleta), Depressaria 
alstremeriana feed on Hemlock. 
Conzum, Theophrastus, is from the Greek for hemlock. The second 
Latin name indicates the spotted stem. It is called Bad Man’s Oat- 
meal, Herb Bennet, Bunk, Cambuck, Caxes, Heck-how, Hemlock, 
Humlock, Humly, Heck, Kex, Kelk, Kous, Keish, Kewse, St. Bennet’s 
Herb, Wode Whistle. Cambuck is a name for the dry stalks. 
“Some horses were of the brume cow frainit, 
And some of the green bay tree, 
But mine was made of a hemlock schaw, 
And a stout stallion was he.” 
Shakespeare speaks of the root of the Hemlock, ‘“ digged i’ the 
dark”, in connection with witches and witchcraft. In the MWasgue of 
Queens Ben Jonson speaks of it as a baleful draught. 
* It is poisonous, and was lately included in the British Pharma- 
copeeia. Sheep are said to eat it, but cattle refuse it; when in the 
dry seasons they are driven to taste it they exhibit symptoms of mad- 
ness. According to an old botanical writer, Ray, who did much to 
establish botany as a science in this country, the thrush feeds on the 
seeds. 
Its action is like that of an opiate and narcotic, used for deadening 
pain and assisting suppuration. It was regarded as beneficial in cases 
of scrofula and cancer. A bitter, acrid juice is derived from the stem, 
and it is harsh to the taste. 
It has the effect of causing giddiness, nausea, headache in some, 
though it has the opposite effect on others, just as tobacco has. Or, as 
Lucretius says: 
“ Pinguescere s@pe Cicuta 
Barbigeros pecudes homini que est acre venenum”— 
‘what is one man’s meat is another man’s poison”, in other words. 
EssenTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS :— 
124. Contum maculatum, \..—Stem tall, erect, branched, spotted, 
smooth, hollow, leaves large, smooth, pinnate, flowers white, in uni- 
lateral partial involucre, with bracts below, carpels ribbed. 
