LACTUCA VIROSA. 
37 
the various preparations of squill, gum ammoniac, &c. and a small 
addition of opium is generally useful, particularly if the digitalis 
purges. The tincture may be generally given in doses of from ten 
to twenty drops ; in some cases of mania, it has been given in much 
larger doses, sixty or more drops have been given for a dose. The 
fresh plant is sometimes prescribed in infusion, but where a 
liquid medicine is preferred, one drachm of the dried leaves, infused 
for four hours in half a pint of boiling water, adding to the strained 
liquor, an outhce of spt. cinnam., or spt. junip. comp. will be found 
preferable to an infusion of the fresh leaves ; of this infusion, one 
ounce may be taken, two or three times in a day. 
Off. The leaves and seeds. 
Off. Pp. Tinct. Digitahs, L. E. D. Decoct. Digitalis, D. 
Infusum Digitalis, L. E, 
♦ 
LACTUCA VIROSA, 
Strong Scented Lettuce.'^ 
Class Syngenesia. — Order tEqualis. 
Nat, Ord. Composite Semiflosculos^, Linn. 
CiCHORACEiE, JUSS. 
Gen. Char. JKecepfacZe naked. C«??/x imbricated, cylindrical, 
its scales membraneous at their margin. Pappus simple, 
stipitate. Seeds polished. 
Spec. Char. Leaves horizontal, toothed, the keel prickly. 
The generic name given this tribe of plants is supposed to be 
derived from the juice bearing a great resemblance to milk; the 
specific name, Virosa, from its possessing deleterious properties. 
The Lactuca Virosaf is a biennial plant, growing wild in many 
parts of Britain; flowering in July and August, delighting in gravelly 
rubbishy soils: usually found growing on the sides of roads, fields, 
* Fig. a. represents the superior part of a plant with the flower of the natural size. 
b. A lloret (magnified.) c. A seed, with its pappus. 
+ Fourteen species of the Genus Lactuca are known and cultivated in our botanic 
gardens. Hort. Cant. 
