718 ilANUAL OF POISONOUS PLANTS 



1. Solanum (Tourn.) L. Nightshade 



Herbs or shrubs, often with stellate pubescence; flowers in cymose, um- 

 bellate, or racemose clusters; calyx bell-shaped or rotate generally 5-parted 

 or S-cleft, corolla rotate S-lobed or cleft, plaited in the bud; stamens exserted, 

 filaments short inserted on the throat, anthers converging around the style 

 opening at the top; ovary usually 2-celled, stigma small; berry with persistent 

 calyx at the base or enclosing it; seeds numerous. About 900 species of wide 

 distribution. Several are troublesome weeds as horse nettle {Solatium carolin- 

 ense) and buffalo bur. (6". rostratum) . The potato (5". tuberosum) and egg- 

 plant {S. Melongena), are cultivated. 



Fig. 418. Common potato {Solanum tuberosum). 

 The potato under some conditions is very poisonous, 

 especially when the tops are green, (I,ois Pammel). 



Solanum Dulcamara L. Bittersweet 



A more or less pubescent perennial, stem climbing or straggling, somewhat 

 woody below ; leaves petioled ovate or hastate, the upper usually halberd shaped ; 

 flowers purple or blue in cymes ; berry globose, red. 



Distribution. Naturalized from Europe, New Brunswick to New Jersey, 

 Pennsylvania, Kansas to Minnesota. 



Poisonous properties. The plant contains the alkaloid solanin CjgH^gNOjj 

 -|-H,0, with a hot, bitter taste, dulcamarin a bitter principle ^^^^fiio'^^^^z^ 

 and the alkaloids solanidin C^„Hg^NO and solanein C^jHjgNOjg. 



Chesnut says with reference to this plant: 

 Besides sotanin, (0.3 percent), this plant contains another less poisonous compound, 

 dulcamarin^ which gives it its peculiar bitter-sweet taste. Neither of the compounds is abun- 

 dant. The berry, though its taste is not remarkably disagreeable, is somewhat poisonous, and 

 it has been shown that an extract of the leaves is moderately so. The plant has nevertheless 

 caused some ill effect. The treatment is the same used in case of the above species. 



According to Schimpfky the berries of this plant have been used to poison 

 dogs and the juice of the fruit acts as a poison to rabbits. Fluckiger and 

 Hanbury in their Pharmacographia, make this statement with reference to 

 Dulcamara : 



Dulcamara is occasionally given in the form of decoction, in rheumatic or' cutaneous af- 

 fections; but its real action, according to Garrod, is unknown. This physician remarks that it 

 does not dilate the pupil or produce dryness of the throat like belladonna, henbane or stramon- 

 ium. He has given to a patient 3 pints of the decoction per diem without any marked action, 

 and has also administered as much as half a pound of the fresh berries with no ill effect. 



