41 6 CUCURBITACE^E 



fibers, and, when deprived of the epidermis, makes a good substitute for 

 sponge. The fruit of Luffa echinata, growing in India, contains a principle 

 related to, if not identical with, colocynthitin. 



547. MOMORDICA BALSAMINA Linne. BALSAM APPLE. This is a climbing 

 East Indian plant, cultivated in our gardens for the sake of its cucumber-like 

 fruit, which is often used in domestic practice as a vulnerary. 



548. PEPO. PUMPKIN SEED 



PUMPKIN SEED 

 The ripe seed of Cucur'bita pe'po Linnet 



BOTANICAL CHARACTERISTICS. Stem hispid, procumbent; tendrils branched. 

 Leaves very large, cordate, palmately 5-lobed. Fruit yellow, very large 

 (sometimes two feet in diameter), roundish or oblong, smooth, and 

 furrowed. 



HABITAT. Tropical Asia and America. 



DESCRIPTION or DRUG. Flat, broadly ovate seeds, about 20 mm. ( in.) 

 long, and 2 mm. Q>{ 2 m -) thick, with a flat ridge and shallow groove 

 around the edge; testa dull white, inclosing two flat, white, oily 

 cotyledons and a short radicle; inodorous; taste bland and oily. 



Powder. Microscopical elements of: See Part iv, Chap. I, B. 



CONSTITUENTS. From 30 to 40 per cent, of a thick, red fixed oil, an acrid 

 resin, considered to be the taeniafuge principle, starch, sugar, fatty 

 acids, and the proteids, myosin and vitellin, the myosin precipitating 

 from an infusion saturated with NaCl, and the addition of COj 

 separating out the vitellin, apparently identical with that of egg yolk. 



ACTION AND USES. Taeniafuge. Dose: i to 2 oz. (30 to 6p Gm.), in 

 emulsion. 



549. CITRULLUS. WATERMELON SEED. The seed of Cucu'mis citrul'lus 

 Seringe. Indigenous to Southern Asia, but cultivated extensively in the 

 United, States. Differs from the pumpkin seed in being blackish-marbled 

 or brownish in color, somewhat smaller, and with a blunt, ungropved edge. 

 They are used like pumpkin seeds as a taeniafuge, and also have diuretic and 

 demulcent properties. Dose: 2 dr. to 2 oz. (8 to 60 Gm.). 



550. CUCUMIS SATIVTJS Linnd. CUCUMBER SEED. Flat and thin, lance- 

 oblong, from 8 to 12 mm. (^| to % in.) long, acutely edged, ungrooved, dull 

 white in color. Resembles above in properties. 



551. ELATERIUM. A peculiar resinous substance obtained from the fruit of 

 Ecbal'lium elate'rium A. Richards (squirting cucumber), a vine growing in 

 the Mediterranean regions of Europe, Africa, and Asia. The fruit, when 

 ripe, separates suddenly from its stalk, and the internal pressure forces the 

 juice out of the aperture thus made in a stream; in collecting, therefore, the 

 fruits are gathered green, sliced, and the juice expressed by slight pressure; 

 on standing it deposits a sediment, which, when dried, forms the commercial 

 Elaterium. 



Elaterium is in flat pieces of varying sizes, light and friable, pale green 

 when fresh, but taking on a gray or light buff color as it becomes older; the 

 surface is covered with small crystals of elaterin; odor somewhat tea-like; 

 taste acrid and intensely bitter, due to the active ingredient, elaterin, which 

 constitutes from 25 to 30 per cent, of the drug. This principle is insoluble 



