SUBSTANCES REPUTED MEDICINAL. 183 
but more extended experience will be necessary before its true 
value can be assigned. 
Since the above was written the so-called alkaloid has been 
examined in England, and found to consist mainly of calcium 
oxalate! (Pharm. Fourn., 7th Fan., 1888.) No explanation has, 
up to the present, been submitted in explantion of what is either 
crass ignorance or trifling. 
Some people contend that this plant contains no poisonous 
principle, yet cases of poisoning (chiefly of animals) seem without 
‘any doubt to have been traced to this particular plant. But per- 
haps its virulence only exists at a certain stage of its growth. 
In Western New South Wales the aboriginals use an infusion 
or decoction of the plant in genital diseases, and use rather strong 
doses, but it is said that an overdose simply causes headache. 
Mr. P. A. O’Shanesy observes that this plant is said to be an 
infallible remedy for dysentery and low fever. 
Throughout the colonies. 
64. Euphorbia pilulifera, Z2v2., (Syn. Z. hirta, Linn. ; £. capit- 
ata, Lam.; £. globulifera, Kunth; £. vertictllata, Vellox); 
N.O., Euphorbiacez, B.FI., vi., 51. 
* Asthma Herb,” or ‘‘ Queensland Asthma Herb.”’ 
This plant having obtained some reputation in Australia in 
certain pulmonary complaints, has acquired the appellation in the 
colonies of ‘ Queensland Asthma Herb.’’ Nevertheless, it is by 
no means endemic in Australia, for it is a common tropical weed. 
Bentham gives the following places where it abounds :—All 
tropical America, from Florida and New Mexico to Brazil and 
Peru; tropical Africa, from the western coast to Mozambique ; 
Mauritius, East Indies, South Sea Islands,* China, Japan, Sand- 
wich Islands, Ceylon, and Queensland, about Rockhampton. 
(Northern Australia must now be added.) 
* Seemann (Flora Vitiensis, p. 217), however, says that this is evidently a comparatively 
recent introduction to Polynesia, as it was not mentioned or collected by the older botanists. 
If this be so, doubtless it is an introduction into Australia too. He gives the Fijian name 
as “Do ni osi” (i.e., horse-dung, from the natives believing that this weed was introduced 
together with the horse). 
