287 SCHCENOCAULON OFFICINALE 



outwards; in the barren flowers the carpels are rudimentary. 

 Fruit composed of three dry follicles about \ inch long, surrounded 

 at the base by the withered perianth and slightly spreading at the 

 top; pericarp pale brown, papery, dehiscing down the ventral 

 suture. Seeds (often abortive) 2 5 in each follicle, dark brown, 

 fusiform, somewhat compressed, prolonged above into a mem- 

 branous wing ; embryo very small, immersed in copious endosperm 

 at the base near the hilum. 



Habitat. The Sabadilla is found in grassy places on open hills 

 in Mexico, Guatemala, and Venezuela. The plant found in the 

 neighbourhood of Caracas has somewhat broader and more 

 distinctly carinate leaves, but can scarcely be held to constitute 

 a different species. Sabadilla and Schoenocaulon differ only in 

 the former having polygamous flowers, and the two genera may 

 be, therefore, combined with propriety. The date of both 

 names is 1837 (the latter genus having been founded on 8. gracile), 

 so that we are free to adopt either. 



Veratrum Sabadilla, Eetzius, Obs. Bpt., i, p. 31 (1779), is also 

 a source of Sabadilla, having been originally described from a 

 raceme of flowers picked out from among the drug. They were 

 polygamous, with purplish-black, ovate perianth leaves. Des- 

 courtilz gives a full description of a ."West Indian plant under 

 the same name with a figure which is reproduced in Nees, t. 48, 

 and represents a true Veratrum. Mr. Baker is inclined to refer 

 it to the common European V. nigrum, L. The plant, however, 

 is not known in our herbaria (see Eoem. and Schultes' Syst., 

 vii, p. 1558, Lindl. PI. Med., p. 586, Kunth, Enum. iv, p. 188, 

 Fliick. and Hanb., Pharmac., p. 634, note). 



Kunth, Enum. Plant, iv, p. 184 ; Ernst, in Journ. Bot., ix, p. 91 ; 

 Lindl., Fl. Med., p. 586. 



Official Parts and Names. SABADILLA; the dried fruit of 

 Asagraea officinalis, Lindl. (B. P.). The seeds (Sabadilltc Semina) 

 of Asagraea officinalis (I. P.). SABADILLA; the seeds of Veratrum 

 Sabadilla, Eetzius, (U. S. P.). 



Commerce, General Characters, and Composition. It seems 

 probable that the Sabadilla, Cevadilla, or Cebadilla of commerce, 



