246 TREES AND TREE-PLANTING. 
opaque color. Its chief use is as an excipient for various 
plasters. It is itself lightly rubefacient, and may even 
produce a slight inflammation in sensitive skins; occa- 
sionally also vesication and ulceration may attack the 
seat of its application. It is useful in rheumatic pains of 
a chronic nature, and particularly, perhaps, in lumbago. 
Canada pitch is very closely analogous to Burgundy 
pitch in its properties, but is more readily softened by 
heat, a property which sometimes offers an objection to 
its substitution for the latter. 
AiscuLus urrocasranum (Horse-chestnut). The bark 
of the horse-chestnut has been an object of much inter- 
est, because of its furnishing a possible substitute for 
cinchona. The bark of branches of trees of from three 
to five years of age is considered the best. The claims 
which have been made for it in this connection cannot, 
however, be said to have been substantiated, although 
the bark certainly does possess some degree of antiperi- 
odic property. It may be given in substance or in the 
form of a decoction or extract. The dose of the bark is 
from half an ounce to an ounce. 
AXscuuvs pavia, the red buckeye of the Southern States, 
yields a fruit which is actively poisonous, producing 
symptoms analogous to those caused by strychnia. It 
has not been utilized to any extent in medicine. 
AILaNntHus GLANDULosa. This tree, popularly known 
as the “Tree of Heaven,” which has been of late years 
cultivated to some extent in this country as a shade-tree, 
has valuable medicinal properties. The bark is a very 
active anthelmintic, its administration being followed by 
copious stools, with which are usually associated traces 
of the worm (tapeworm) when it is present in the intes- 
tines. The dose for this purpose is about thirty grains. 
The bark, or its fluid extract, has also been used with 
good effect in nervous affections, such as nervous palpi- 
tation of the heart, hiccough, etc., and in spasmodic 
asthma. 
