8 BULLETIN 69, U. S. DEPAETMENT OF AGEXCULTUEE. 



In Siberia the crushed nut is used for sypliiUtic symptoms, and in 

 Norway for gout, while the seeds have been used as a diuretic' 



In the nineteenth edition of Wood and Bache's Dispensatory of 

 the United States, p. 1449, are the following statements: "At present 

 the plant (Cicuta virosa) is never used internally, and rarely ex- 

 ternally as an anodyne poultice in local pains/' 



"Cicuta (maculata) has been liighly lauded as a specific in nervous 

 and sick headache, but is rarely, if ever, used." (Stearns, 1858, 

 p. 253.) 



pragendorff, 1898, p. 487, states that in Oregon Cicuta is used 

 as an arrow poison. 



Cicuta has sometimes been used for committing suicide, although 

 it is probable that the statement which is made by some writers to 

 the effect that it was kept by the people of Marseilles for this pur- 

 pose is inaccurate, as it is more hkely that Conium was used. 



Rafinesque, 1828, page 110, says "The Indians when tired of life 

 are said to poison themselves with the roots of this plant." 



Caiilard, 1829, tells of a laborer who purchased and ate the root 

 for suicidal purposes, but recovered after being given an emetic. 



Trojanowsky, 1874, relates how a laborer, after a drunken spree 

 and a domestic quarrel, left home and was the next day found dead, 

 the cause of death being -Cicuta. The evidence was considered 

 sufficient to prove that he ate the root of Cicuta virosa with the 

 deliberate purpose of committing suicide. 



Trojanowsky refers also to another case, the "Kobeilla'sche Proc- 

 ess," but it has been impossible to verify tliis, as the reference in 

 Trojanowsky's paper is evidently wrong. 



Pribram, 1900, tells of an interesting case. A woman having 

 suffered considerable domestic infelicity, on her way to arrange for 

 a divorce called on a fortune teller to find out whether she would 

 succeed in the separation. The fortune teller told her that the sepa- 

 ration was unnecessary, as her husband would not live more than 

 one year and advised her to measure the shadow of her husband with 

 a stick, throw the stick upon a stream, saying " I lay down not this 

 stick but thy fife, and as the stick becomes broken in its passage, so 

 shall thy life be cut off." Upon the woman replying that she did 

 not wish her husband to die, the fortune teller went to a swamp and 

 gathered three roots, calhng them "neapte de boalta," and told her 

 to make a mash of two of these roots, two potatoes, some corn meal, 

 sheep cheese, and onions, and bake a cake of it for her husband to eat. 

 After eating this root, her husband would go about for three months 

 in a stunned condition and would not abuse her or compel her to 

 live with him. If her husband after eating the cake should become 

 iU, the fortune teller would give her tea, so that he should net die. 



1 Brandt, Phoebus, and Ratzeburg, 1838, p. 111. 



