LEQTJMIN0S2E-FAPILI0NACE2E. 



375 



edible part. 1 With these nutritive principles is often found asso- 

 ciated a deleterious acrid substance, sometimes narcotic, whose 

 powers are usually destroyed by heat. This is to a slight extent 

 the case with the fresh and raw ripe seeds of most Peas, Beans, 

 Kidney-beans, &c. Thus it is that those of Lathyrus Aphaccc will 

 produce headache and drowsiness. Those of the " Liquorice-vine" 

 (Fr., Liane-Rvglisse*) and Anagyrisfwtida" are said to have this pro- 

 perty to a yet higher degree. Cases are known where grave accidents 

 have occurred through eating the seeds of several European kinds of 

 Broom and Laburnum. It is probably for a similar reason that the 

 flour of Ervum Ervilia, 5 when mixed with that of cereals, gives 

 bread a deleterious property. The seeds of several Leguminosce are 

 used in fishing to poison the game, and the leaves and bark are often 

 preferred, as we shall see below ; while the seeds of the Indigo 

 plants are reputed as poisonous in warm countries. But this dan- 

 gerous quality is nowhere so strongly marked as in the famous 

 Calabar-bean, 6 better known perhaps as Ordeal-bean (Fi\, poison 

 d'cpreuve), the seed of Physostigma venenosum, 7 from tropical Africa. 

 The extract or the contained alkaloids 8 are well known as possessing 

 the peculiar power of contracting the pupil of the eye. In many 

 species the vegetative organs share these irritant or narcotic pro- 

 perties with the seeds. The leaves of many species of Cytisus, 

 Genista, Colutea, Coronilla, Robinia, Clitoria, Indigo/era, Tepkrosia, 

 Ononis, Antliyllis, Abrus, LoncJtocarpus, &c, are irritant, purgative, 

 emetic, 9 sometimes even vesicant, as in ArthroJobium scorpioides. 

 The shoots of Sabinea fiorida are poisonous. 10 In Australia cattle 

 have suffered from browsing on several species of Gomjjholobium or 



1 The edible starchy matter accumulates 

 pretty often in the roots, as in our Orobus tube- 

 rosus L. or Tuberous Bitter- vetch, Apios tuberosa 

 and Psoralen esculenfa Pursh, Fl. Bor.-Amer., 

 ii. 275, t. 22 ;— DC, Prodr., ii. 219, n. 39, which 

 has been suggested as a succedaneum to the 

 potato, as also Pueraria tuberosa, &c. 



2 L., Spec, 1029. A species remarkable for 

 the almost constant abortion of the leaflets and 

 the corresponding great development of its leafy 

 stipules. 



3 Abrus precatorius L., Syst., 533. — Glycine 

 Abrus L., Spec, 1025. (See H. Bn., in Diet. 

 Encycl. des Se. Med., i. 205.) 



4 This plant is also purgative. (See H. Bn., 

 in Diet. Encycl. des Sc. Mud., iv. 59.) 



s L., Spec, 1QU).— ricia Ercilia W. (See 

 Lindl., Veg. Kinyd., 548.) 



6 Or Chop Bean ; Esere of the natives. 



7 Balf., in Trans. Soc Edinb., xxii. 305. — 

 IIanbuky, in Pharm. Journ., ser. 2, iv. 559 ; v. 

 25. — Feasee, On the Char., Act., &c., of the 

 ordeal Bean of Calabar (thes. Edinb., 1862). — 

 J. C. Lopez, Etude sur la Eeve de Calabar 

 (these de Paris, 1864). — Buciien, in Bot. Zi it. 

 (1863), n. 47.— K£v., in Bull. Soc Bot. de Fr., 

 x. 538. — G. Pi., in Gum., Droy. Simpl., ed. 6, 

 iii. 380. 



8 Physostiymine and eserine (see Vf:E, Rech., 

 Chim. et Phys., &c, these de Paris, 1865). 



9 Among others Genista purgans L. (Spec, 

 999. — Spartium puryans L., Syst., -1-7-1) ; the 

 False Senna of Egypt (Tepkrosia Apollinea DC, 

 Prodr., ii. 254, n. 51); the False Senna of Popayan 

 (T. Senna II. B. K., Nov. Gen.et Sjpee.,vi. loS). 



10 Scnojin., ex Lindi., Veg. Kingd., 5 IS. 



