717 



ATROPA BELLADONNA. 



ATROPA BELLADONNA. 



or room of audience. If our conjectures, founded on this obscure 

 passage of Varro, descriptive of the parts of a Roman house, be correct, 

 we would suggest that the compluvium means rather the rim or gutter 

 from which the rain fell [HOUSE, ROMAS] than the whole area of the 

 open space over the impluvium. 



The term Atrium is derived, according to Varro (' Ling. Lat.' iv.), 

 from the Atriates, a people of Tuscany, from whom the pattern of it 

 was taken. It was the most important and usually the most splendid 

 apartment of a Roman house. Here the owner received his crowd of 

 morning visitors, who were not admitted to the inner apartments. 

 Originally the Atrium was the common room of resort for the whole 

 family the place of their domestic occupations ; and such it probably 

 continued in the humbler ranks of life. It consisted of a large apart- 

 ment roofed over, but with an opening in the centre, called compluvium, 

 towards which the roof sloped so as to throw the rain-water into a 

 cistern in the floor called impluvium. Vitruvius distinguishes five 

 species of Atria. 



1. Tuscanicum, or Tuscan Atrium, the oldest and simplest of all. 

 It wag merely an apartment, the roof of which was supported by four 

 beams crossing each other at right angles, the included space forming 

 the compluvium. Many of these remain at Pompeii. 



2. The Tetrastyle, or four-columned Atrium, resembled the Tuscan, 

 except that the girders, or main beams of the roof, were supported by 

 pillars, placed at the four angles of the impluviuni. This furnished 

 means of increasing the size of the apartment. 



3. The Corinthian Atrium differed from the Tetrastyle only in the 

 number of columns and size of the impluvium. A greater proportion of 

 the roof seems to have been left open. 



4. Atrium displuviatum had its roof inclined the contrary way, so 

 as to throw the water off to the outside of the house, instead of carrying 

 it into the impluvium. 



5. The Atrium testudiuatum was roofed all over, without any vacancy, 

 or compluvium. (' Pompeii,' vol. ii.) 



The magnificence of the Atria will be better understood from the 

 annexed representation of the Atrium of the house of Pansa, restored 

 by Mr. Gandy Deering, and published in the second volume of the 

 ' Pompeii,' in the series of the ' Library of Entertaining Knowledge.' 

 The walls (parietes) were painted with elegant designs in the style of 

 arabesque painting [ARABESQUE], often surrounding compartments in 

 which were frequently depicted the most celebrated subjects of ancient 

 mythology, and even on the very floors mythological or historical 

 pictures were executed in mosaic. [MOSAIC.] 



For the details of the Atria of Pompeii we must refer the reader to 

 Mazois' ' Antiques de Pompei,' folio, and to the first and second series 

 of Cell's ' Pompeii,' as well as to the volumes on ' Pompeii' published 

 by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. In the Pompeian 

 Court at the Crystal Palace, Sydenham, there is a very careful resto- 

 ration of a Pompeian house, which will give a much better idea of the 

 Roman Atrium, with its connected apartments, than can possibly be 

 obtained from engravings or a description. 



Atrium of the llouse of Pansa. 



ATROPA BELLADONNA, Medical utei of. This species is 

 admitted into the Pharmacopoeias of this country, and is employed in 

 the form of dried leaves, or of an extract. Its action on the human 

 system differs according to the quantity taken. If the dose be small, 

 a quickening of the heart's action follows, and an increased quantity of 

 blood is sent to the brain. In this case it has a stimulating effect ; but 

 if the dose be larger, though some stimulating action is for a short 

 time apparent, a sedative effect of a very powerful kind ensues. During 

 the first stage, excitement of the heart, the brain, and the intellectual 

 faculties, is manifest ; this is succeeded by greatly diminished sensi- 

 bility, perhaps most markedly observable in the extreme dilatation of 

 the pupil, and the insensibility of the stomach to the stimulus of emetic 

 substances. The spinal cord would appear not to be directly influenced 

 by this agent, but to suffer at last from the impaired state of the 

 function of respiration, and the consequently deteriorated condition of 

 the blood. Convulsions, therefore, only occur late in cases of poisoning 

 by this article. It deserves to be remarked, that the delirium accom- 

 panying the action of an overdose of belladonna is always of a gay, 

 elevated kind; a red eruption, or efflorescence, on the skin is also 

 generally observable. The nausea and vomiting are unaccompanied 

 with much pain of the stomach; nor do the stomach and intes- 

 tines present many traces of inflammatory action. The nausea and 

 vomiting seem to be the result of the condition of the circulation in 

 the brain, the gorged state of the vessels of which is rendered obvious 

 by inspection after death. 



The action of belladonna is ascribed to an alkaloid which it contains, 

 called atropia, which exists in combination with malic acid. 



The cases in which belladonna may be advantageously employed are, 

 diseases of increased sensibility of the nerves, particularly local affections 

 of these, such as tic douloureux and other pains. It has also been 

 recommended for the cure of scrofulous and cancerous tumours, and is 

 employed to dilate the pupil in certain states of diseases of the eye. 

 In the first set of cases, it may be employed either internally or 

 externally. In tic douloureux, given internally along with areenious 



acid, it often affords speedy and lasting relief. In the passage of gall- 

 stones through the gall-duct, or of stones from the kidney, applied 

 externally over the painful part, it gives great ease. 



Its employment in cases of scrofulous and cancerous enlargement of 

 the glands is likewise either internal or external. That it relieves the 

 pain attendant on such affections is unquestionable ; but it cannot be 

 used to effect the cure of these with safety. It undoubtedly changes 

 the process of deposition throughout the whole body, and also in 

 morbid structure, into one of absorption as is proved by the diminished 

 solidity and increased fluidity of the body, as observed in cases of 

 poisoning by it, where the great quantity of fluids favours the decom- 

 position of the bodies which have died from its influence, and in which 

 putrefaction always takes place .very soon. But an equal degree of 

 benefit may be obtained from the employment of antimonial prepara- 

 tions, without the danger which attends the use of this plant. 



Its employment in the form of extract rubbed over the eyelids, to 

 dilate the pupil previous to the operation for cataract, is an usual step, 

 but requires caution : the same remark is applicable to its use in the 

 form of solution dropped into the eye during inflammation of the iris. 

 In both these cases it is liable to be absorbed in too great a degree, and 

 to cause alarming symptoms. 



Belladonna has been recommended as a useful sedative in the latter 

 stages of hooping-cough. But though it lessens the violence of the 

 spasmodic action, the same degree of benefit may be obtained from 

 hydrocyanic acid, without the liability of inducing that action of the 

 vessels of the brain which ends in hydrocephalus. (See Golis on 

 ' Hydrocephalus.') Belladonna has also been proposed as a preventive 

 of scarlet fever ; but it is by no means certain to ward off this disease, 

 while it is almost sure to induce hydrocephalus, on which account its 

 use is to be reprobated. Other preventive measures of a safer kind 

 should therefore be had recourse to. 



In case of poisoning by it, if taken into the stomach, the most 

 immediate means should be employed to remove it. For this purpose 

 the stomach-pump is best. Emetics can seldom excite the stomach to 



