4 BULLETIN 69, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
given as a synonym of Angelica hirsuta, A. villosa. The symptoms 
described do not at all correspond to those produced by Cicuta. 
Stockbridge, 1814, tells of the poisoning of three boys, with one 
fatality, giving details of the symptoms and treatment. He tells 
also of another case of a boy 6 or 7 years old who died after violent 
convulsive fits ‘‘and the most awful and exquisite sufferings I ever 
witnessed.”’ 
Ely and Muhlenberg, 1815, tell of a similar case of three boys, two 
of whom died. Bigelow, 1817, describes the plant, giving a general 
statement in regard to its poisonous properties, and refers to the 
cases mentioned by Stockbridge and Ely. 
Hazeltine, 1818, tells of the “fatal effects of a poisonous root.” 
He did not identify the plant, but his account of the symptoms 
makes it certain that it was Cicuta maculata. 
During the nineteenth century a considerable literature in regard 
to poisoning by Cicuta in North America grew up, a large part of it 
relating to losses of live stock, although there have been very many 
recorded cases of the poisoning of human beings, and it is known 
that many cases, perhaps the larger number, have not been published. 
Most of these accounts are more or less fragmentary in character, and 
it is not considered necessary to give a synopsis of them. 
THE GENUS CICUTA. 
The following description of the genus Cicuta is compiled from the 
last edition of Gray’s Manual: * 
A perennial umbellifer growing from a rootstock, with pinnately compound leaves 
and serrate leaflets. Involucre usually none, involucels of several slender bractlets, 
flowers white. Fruit ovoid to nearly orbicular, glabrous, with strong, flattish, corky 
ribs, the lateral largest; oil tubes conspicuous, solitary; stylopodium depressed; seed 
nearly terete. 
The genus is distributed in the northern continents. A large 
number of species have been described, most of which are so closely 
related to each other that in many cases the validity of the species 
has been questioned. The common species of the eastern United 
States is maculata, which has been, by some, considered as not 
specifically distinct from the European virosa. 
Probably all species are equally poisonous, and in popular parlance 
no distinction of species is made. 
DISTINCTION BETWEEN CICUTA AND CONIUM. 
From the standpoint of a poisonous plant Cicuta is more likely to 
be confounded with Conium than with any other umbelliferous 
plant. 
1 Seventh edition, p. 614. 
