182. MEDICINAL AND POISONOUS PLANTS 
Out of the large number of drugs consisting of or containing 
poisonous alkaloids the few following may be taken as familiar 
examples: opium, tobacco, coca, atropine, quinine, strychnine, 
and aconite. 
Opium is the dried milky juice which flows from wounds 
made in the seed-pods of the opium poppy (Fig. 172). It 
Fic. 172, I.—Cpium Poppy (Papaver somniferum, Poppy Family, Papaver- 
acee). Flowering and fruiting top. (Baillon.)—An annual about 
1 m. tall; leaves pale green; flowers white, red, or purplish; fruit dry, 
smooth. Native home, Mediterranean region. 
has been found to contain twenty different alkaloids. Of 
these morphine (C,;H,,NO;) is the most important. The 
chief uses of opium in medicine are to relax spasm, relieve 
pain, and induce sleep. Among various oriental peoples large 
quantities are consumed by smoking and in other ways as an 
