BITTER APPLE, CUCUMBER, OR COLOCYNTH. 203 



such practices, I have found, says he, the ipecacuanha more manage- 

 able than the other, and generally to be more easy to the patient." 

 Ipecacuan, particularly in the state of powder, is now advanta- 

 geously employed in almost every disease in which vomiting is indi- 

 cated ; and when combined with opium, under the form of pulvis 

 sudoriricus, it furnishes us with the most usetul and active sweating 

 medicine which we possess. It is also given with advantage in very 

 small doses even when it produces no sensible operation. The full 

 dose of ipecacuan in substance is a scruple, though less doses will 

 frequently produce an equal effect. 



[Schreber. Piso. Trans. Lin, Soc. 



SECTION xxm. 



Bitter Apple, Cucumber, or Colocynth, 

 Cucumis Coldcynthis. 



The colocynth, or coloquintida, is a species of cucumber. The 

 root is annual, white, divided into long branches, which strike 

 deeply into the ground ; the steins trail, like those of the garden 

 cucumber, a considerable length, and are beset with rough hairs; 

 the leaves are of a triangular shape, obtuse, variously situated, hairy, 

 on the upper surface of a fine green, beneath rough, and whitish ; 

 the flowers are yellow, solitary, and appear at the axillae of the 

 leaves; the calyx of the male flowers is bell-shaped, and divided at 

 the brim into five tapering segments ; the corolla is monopetalous, 

 bell-shaped, and divided at the limb into pointed segments; the 

 filaments are three, two of which are bifid at the apex ; they are all 

 very short, and inserted into the calyx ; the antherae are linear, long, 

 erect, and adhere together on the outer side ; the calyx and corolla 

 of the female flower are similar to those of the male; the three 

 filaments are without antherae : the germen is large ; the style cy. 

 lindrical, very short, furnished with three stigmata, which are thick, 

 gibbous, bifid, and bent outwardly ; the fruit is a round apple, of 

 the size of an orange, divided into three cells, abounding with a 

 pulpy matter, separated every where by cellular membrane, and in- 

 cluding many ovate compressed seeds. The flowers appear from 

 May till August. 



Colocynth is imported for use to this part of Europe from Tur- 



