408 hog's-fennel. 



petals, tipped with roundish anthers. The germen is oblong, supporting 

 two small recurved styles, tenninated by obtuse emarginate stigmas. The 

 fruit is broadly elliptical, tawny. (See Gen. Char.) Plate 25, Fig. 4j (a) 

 entire flower magnified ; (b) calyx, germen, and styles ; {c) the fruit, some- 

 what magnified ; (d) the two carpels separating at maturity. 



This plant, a native of the south and middle of Europe, has been long 

 naturalized in England, though rare, being only found in salt marshes and 

 ditches in the south-eastern parts of the island, flowering from July to 

 September. 



The genus takes its name from the irsuxsJavav of Dioscorides and the 

 other Greek writers, which is supposed to be identical with this plant ; 

 so called from vtux-zi, a jmie-free, in allusion to the bituminous odour of the 

 root. This odour has also been compared to that of sulphur, which, to- 

 gether with the yellow colour of the juice, has suggested the name svlphur- 

 tvort. It has also been called horestrong, horestrange, and harestrong, 

 corruptions apparently of the German haarstrang. 



Qualities. — The fresh root has a strong, fetid, sulphureous smell, and 

 a heavy, unctuous, subacrid, bitterish taste. The roots wounded in spring 

 exude a large quantity of yellow juice, which soon concretes into a hard 

 gum-resin, having all the sensible properties of the plant. 



Medical Properties and Uses.— The root of this plant was a 

 favourite remedy with Hippocrates and his immediate successors *, and was 

 recommended in coughs, phlegmatic obstructions of the lungs, nephritic 

 pains, flatulencies, and difficult labours, and externally in hemicrania, 

 ulcers, and painful tumours. By modern writers it is almost totally dis- 

 regarded, and is seldom or never used in the present day ; nevertheless, it 

 is by no means inert, and might probably be substituted occasionally for 

 the gum-resins ammoniacum and galbanum. Bergius, indeed, designates 

 the root as anti-hysteric, diuretic, and emmenagogue; and Deliusf men- 

 tions a case of suppressed menses which yielded to it, as well as an ob- 

 stinate scorbutic complaint, In which the persevering use of the decoction 

 and vinous extract 'proved beneficial. 



The vinous extract in the dose of twenty to thirty grains has been much 

 lauded in hysteric afi^ections and hypochondriasis. The inspissated juice or 

 the extract has also been made into a syrup, either alone or with the addi- 

 tion of liquorice-root and leaves of coltsfoot, as a remedy for asthmas and 

 inveterate coughs. " Externally it is recommended for the cure of certain 

 cutaneous eruptions of the leprous kind, for which purpose a decoction of it 

 should be used for a bath, and in this manner there is little doubt that it 

 would prove efficacious." X 



* Vide Galen de Simpl. lib. viii — J. Bauhin Hist. torn. iii. p. 37G. 

 f Diss, de Peucedano germanico, p. 32, sq. 

 + J. A. Waller, Brit. Dom. Herbal, p. 141. 



END OF VOL. I. 



C. Wooclf;ill, Printer, Anacl Court, Skinner Street; London. 



E.. 



