382 BOTANY AND PHARMACOGNOSY. 



tries, contains a red coloring principle in the flowers and a yellow 

 coloring principle in the roots, the latter being known as morindin 

 and resembling the color principle in madder. 



The pulp of the fruit of Cape jasmine (Gardenia jasminoidcs) 

 contains a yellow coloring principle resembling crocin, found in 

 Crocus. 



The stem and root barks of Button-bush {Cephalanthus occi- 

 dcnfalis) common in swampy regions in the United States, are 

 sometimes used in medicine. The barks contain a bitter glucoside, 

 cephalanthin, and a tasteless glucoside which is fluorescent in solu- 

 tion. MitchcUa repens contains a saponin-like body in the fruit 

 and a tannin and bitter principle in the leaves. Quite a number of 

 species of Galium (bedstraw) are used in medicine and for other 

 purposes. A principle resembling glycyrrhizin is found in wild 

 licorice {Galium circcccaus) , a perennial herb growing in dry 

 woods in the United States, and also in Galium lanceolatum, which 

 is found from Virginia northward to Ontario. The yellow bed- 

 straw (Galium vcrum), naturalized from Europe, contains a milk- 

 curdling ferment. 



b. CAPRIFOLIACE.^ OR HONEYSUCKLE FAMILY. 

 The plants are perennial herbs, shrubs, trees, or woody climbers 

 with opposite, simple or pinnately compound leaves. The flowers 

 are perfect, epigynous, regular, or bilabiate, and arranged in 

 corymbs. The fruit is a berry, drupe or capsule. They are mostly 

 indigenous to the northern hemisphere. 



Vihiirnum prunifolium (Black haw) is a shrub or small tree 

 25 cm. in diameter. The winter buds are acute and reddish- 

 pubescent ; the leaves are ovate, elliptical, obtuse or acute at the 

 apex, somewhat rounded at the base, finely serrulate, glabrous 

 and short-petiolate (Fig. 179) ; the flowers are white and in 

 nearly sessile cymes; the fruit is a small, oval, bluish-black, 

 glaucous, inferior drupe. The root-bark is official (p. 525). 



Viburnum Opulus (Wild guelder-rose or cranberry-tree) is 

 a shrub about half the height of V. prunifolium, with broadly 

 ovate, deeply 3-lobed and coarsely dentate pubescent leaves. The 

 flowers are white and in compound cymes, the outer being 

 sterile and large and showy. Tlie fruit is a reddish, globular, 

 very acid drupe. The bark is official (p. 532). The Snow-ball 



