662 SCIENTIFIC AND APPLIED PHARMACOGNOSY 



nate, the flowers are regular, and have either bell-shaped or some- 

 what bi-labiate corollas; the fruits are either capsules or berries. 

 A very striking characteristic of the family is the occurrence of 

 inulin in place of starch. Laticiferous tubes are abundantly devel- 

 oped in Lobelia, even occurring in the pith, the branches penetrating 

 the tissues of the xylem and uniting with the tubes in the cortex. 

 They are also found in other genera. The trachea? are narrow, and 

 the walls are marked by either simple or bordered pores. The wood 

 fibers usually possess bordered pores. The leaf-teeth are usually 

 terminated by glands, and in close proximity to them on the upper 

 surface are large water pores. The non-glandular hairs are unicellu- 

 lar, being occasionally silicified. Calcium oxalate and glandular 

 hairs are wanting. 



LOBELIA. Indian or Wild Tobacco. The leaves and flowering 

 tops of Lobelia inflata (Fam. Campanulacea?), an annual herb 

 (Fig. 292) indigenous to the eastern and central United States and 

 Canada, and cultivated in New York and Massachusetts. Lobelia 

 should be collected after a portion of the capsules have become 

 inflated, carefully dried and preserved. 



Description. Stem cylindrical, somewhat angular, slightly winged 

 light brown, with numerous spreading hairs, internodes 2 to 3 cm. in 

 length. Leaves elliptical or ovate-lanceolate, alternate, 4 to 9 cm. 

 in length, 8 to 30 mm. in breadth; summit acute or acuminate; base 

 obtuse or acute; margin irregularly denticulate, the divisions with a 

 yellowish-brown, gland-like summit; upper surface yellowish-green 

 or light brown and with scattered bristly hairs; under surface light 

 brown, with numerous bristly hairs, the veins of the first order diverg- 

 ing at an angle of about 65 and curving upward near the margin; 

 petiole either wanting or about 1 mm. in length. Inflorescence in 

 leafy spikes; pedicel about 3 mm. long; calyx 5-parted about 5 mm. 

 in length, the subulate lobes about as long as the tube; corolla 5- 

 parted, tubular, about as long as the calyx, pale blue, upper portion 

 cleft nearly to the base, the lobes on either side of the cleft erect or 

 recurved, the other three united ; stamens with anthers united above 

 into a curved tube; stigma 2-lobed, ovary 2-locular. Fruit an ovoid, 

 inflated capsule 5 to 8 mm. in length, opening at the summit, adher- 

 ing to which are the calyx teeth. Seeds numerous, brownish, some- 

 what ellipsoidal or ovoid, about 0.7 mm. in length, coarsely reticulate. 

 Odor slight; taste mild, becoming acrid. 



INNER STRUCTURE. See Fig. 292. 



Powder. Dark green; non-glandular hairs elongated-conical, 

 from 0.300 to 0.600 mm. in length; fragments of stem with tracheae 



