HEMLOCK. 387 



but so vague were the terms employed in those remote times, in 

 delineating plants having so many common characters as the 

 Umbelliferae, that certainty on this point is unattainable. Indeed, 

 as the term cicuia*, was also applied to that part of fistulous 

 stems between the joints, so con'tuui appears to have denoted more 

 than one poisonous plant, which gives a colour to the opinion that 

 the death-drinks of the Greeks were composed of the juices of 

 several pernicious vegetables, Theophrastus-j- relates, that a cer- 

 tain Thrasyas boasted of having discovered a potion compounded 

 of the juice of conium, poppy, &c. which would destroy life without 

 pain ; and iElian tells us, that the Cean old men, when they had 

 become useless to the state and tired of the infirmities of life, 

 invited each other to a banquet, and having crowned themselves 

 in festive mood, drank the Conium, and terminated their exist- 

 ence. The tranquillity maintained by Socrates J after swallow- 

 ing the deadly potion decreed by the Areopagus, will scarcely 

 accord with the known effects of Hemlock-juice, but that it was 

 an ingredient in the fatal cup seems exceedingly probable, as 

 the plant is very common in Greece, and a southern climate 

 appears greatly to augment its energetic properties. 



Qualities. — The recent plant has a disagreeable odour, re- 

 sembling that of mice or cat's urine. The odour of the properly 

 dried leaves § is strong, heavy, and narcotic, and the taste 

 slightly bitter and narcotic. " The green leaves distilled 

 impregnate the water in the receiver with an insupportably 



* See Virgil, Eel. ii. 1, 36, and v. 1. 85. — Persius Sat. iv. From cicuta 

 ilTost likely is derived kecks, denoting hollow stalks, and kecksies, the name 

 for Hemlock and other plants with fistulous stems in many English counties, 

 while in Wales the true Hemlock is called eegid, and Fool's-Parsley hemlock. 

 Shakspeare distinguishes between them : — 



" Her fallow leas 



The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory. 

 Doth root upon. ***** 



And nothing teems 



But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs, 

 Losing both beauty and utility." — Henry V. act v. sc. 2. 

 f Lib. ix. c. 17- 

 ■^ See the Phoedon of Plato. 



§ For medical use, the leaves should be gathered just before the flowers 

 expand, and the foot-stalks being rejected, dried nearly as directed for Fox- 

 glove, (see p. 334). Great care must be taken to keep them from the action 

 of air and light. 



