772 MANUAL OF POISONOUS PLANTS 



, Mr. Mosely estimates that 5000 animals have succumbed from the disease 

 in a small area in northern Ohio. There are many cases commonly in this 

 same region from milk sickness. 



Dr. Albert C. Crawford of the Bureau of Plant Industry, investigated the 

 so-called milk sickness occurring in Minooka, Illinois, which resulted in the 

 death of about 50 head of cattle, and gives the following conclusions: 



To sum up, it certainJy can not be said that it has been proved that milksickness is du6 

 to any constituent of B. urticaefolium. The transmission of the disease by eating small quan- 

 tities of meat or milk of animals sick with the "trembles" and the fact that cooked meat or 

 boiled milk does not produce this disorder point primarily rather to a parasitic origin while 

 the fact thatEupatorium urticaefolium is abundant in areas where the disease is not known 

 and absent in some milksick districts also indicates that the plant has no relation to the dis- 

 ease. If it does, it would be only an accidental carrier of some pathogenic organism. Ac- 

 cording to reports, the same flora may be in areas in which "trembles" occur as in those free 

 from it, and milksickness is also said to occur where no vegetation grows (inclosed pens)* 

 The disease also has disappeared from an area after simply clearing the woodland where it 

 occurred and turning it into pasture. Again, severe epidemics have occurred in winter when 

 the foliage has disappeared, which would tend to exclude the higher non-evergreen plants as 

 the cause of this disorder. In fact, all the evidence in hand is against the causation of this 

 disease by such plants, and certain analogies with cases of botulismus suggest a somewhat 

 similar cause. If there is any truth in the statement that cattle exposed in pasture to night air 

 especially contract the disease, this fact might suggest the more or less direcct connection of 

 some night organism as a carrier of the parasite, and certain parasites are supposed to be 

 associated with certain localities. Very little is known chemically of Bupatorium urticaefolium. 



And this seems to confirm the investigation by Dr. Bitting of the Indiana 

 Agricultural Experiment Station. It seems very doubtful that this plant causes 

 milk sickness, since it is very common in many pastures in the west where 

 trembles does not occur. 



In regard to boneset (£. purpureum and B. perfoliatum) Dr. Johnson states 

 as follows : 



Of domestic remedies few are better known or more largely used than boneset. It is 

 tonic, diaphoretic, emetic, and cathartic, the different effects depending largely upon the 

 size of the dose and mode of administration. The infusion, taken cold in moderate doses, 

 is tonic, and is employed in debility of the digestive organs and in convalescence. Taken 

 warm in large doses, the infusion or decoction produces copious diaphoresis, and is em- 

 ployed in the acute stages of catarrhal affections and in fevers, especially those of an 

 intermittent or remittent type. In still larger doses the warm infusion or decoction pro- 

 duces emesis or catharsis; these effects are, however, seldom sought. 



E. purpureum, or gravel-root, is said to be diuretic and to have been employed io 

 urinary affections, but it has not attained an established reputation and is seldom used. 



Boneset (B. perfoliatum) contains the glucoside eupatorin; the B. purpureum 

 contains the glucoside euparin C^gH^^Og. 



Dr. T. Holm gives an extended account of the medicinal qualities accompanied 

 by the anatomical structure of this plant. Bupatorium perfoliatum* according ta 

 Dr. Holm is now prescribed as a tonic and in large doses is an emetic. 



9. Trilisa Cass. Trilisa 



Erect perennial herbs, fibrous roots, leaves alternate and simple; heads in 

 terminal corymbose panicles, discoid, 5-10-flowered, fiowers white, receptacle 

 flat; corolla regular, 5-lobed; achenes nearly terete, 10-ribbed. A small genus 

 closely allied to Liatris. Two species native to eastern North America. 



Trilisa odoratissima Cass. Vanilla Plant 

 A rather stout, somewhat glabrous perennial, leaves pale obovate-spatulate^ 



•Merck's Rep. XVII:326-328. f. 1-11. 



