490 
MEDICINAL USE OF CONIUM MACULATUM. 
the addition of the test liquid, and the comparative strengths estimated by the amount 
of dilution that each solution admitted of. 
The 30th July, 1866, a quantity of leaves was collected from a conium plant just 
fairly in flower. All withered and sickly-looking portions, as well as the greater part 
of the petioles, both general and partial, having been rejected, four parcels of 500 grains 
each were accurately weighed out, and designated A 1 , A' 2 , A 3 , and A 4 . Of these, 
A 3 and A 4 were each thoroughly bruised in a mortar for five minutes, and then trans¬ 
ferred to a half-pint bottle, and 1000 grains by weight of diluted alcohol added. The 
mortar was well cleansed and dried between each operation. Parcels A 1 and A 2 were 
placed to dry, thinly spread out on paper, in a darkened room, and occasionally turned. 
The bottles containing A 3 and A 4 were well stopped with corks, covered with thick paper 
and placed in a cellar. 
The same day the leaves were collected from other plants wholly out of flower, and 
having the fruits on the more mature umbels nearly, if not quite, full grown. These 
leaves—the same care being used to reject inferior portions—were likewise weighed into 
parcels of 500 grains each, and designated B 1 , B 2 , B 3 , and B 4 , and were treated exactly 
as the corresponding parcels designated A. 
The fruits that appeared to be full grown were collected from the same plants that 
furnished the leaves designated B, by cutting off Avith scissors the umbellules entire. 
Four parcels of 500 grains each were made of them, designated C 1 , C 2 , C 3 , and C 4 , which 
were treated as parcels A and B had been. 
The partly-grown fruits from the same plants furnishing B and C, consisting of those 
which had but just dropped the flower, and those that were about half grown, situated, 
as they were, on the same umbellules, were collected by cutting off the umbellules 
entire, and four parcels of 500 grains each made, and treated as before. These were 
designated D 1 , B 2 , D 3 , and D 4 . 
On the 3rd of August those parcels that had been placed to dry were weighed, and 
on the 23rd of August were weighed again. The weights being essentially the same in 
both instances, it was concluded that the drying process had reached its limit. The 
several parcels weighed as follows:—A 1 113 grains, A 2 110 grains, B 1 158 grains, 
B 2 159 grains, C l and C 2 each 183 grains, D 1 1854 grains, and D 2 183 grains. 
A 2 (that is, the dried leaves from the plant in full flower) was pounded in a mortar 
tiil the powder all passed through a sieve of 37 meshes to the linear inch. In this 
operation it lost four grains. The remaining 106 grains were placed in a half-pint 
bottle, and 390 grains of water and 1000 grains of diluted alcohol added. The object 
of adding the water was to make the menstruum used, in effect, the same as that in 
which A 3 and A 4 had been put to macerate. Parcel A 1 was wrapped up, first in writing- 
paper and then in thick brown paper, and laid on a shelf, for examination after a time 
sufficiently long to test its keeping properties. 
B 2 , or the leaves from the plants wholly out of floAver, Avere treated in the same way 
that A 2 had been, except that 341 grains of water only were needed to supply that lost 
in the drying process. Parcel B l was treated as A 1 , as were also C 1 and D 1 . C 2 , or the 
full-growm but unripe and green fruits or seeds, was powdered till 169 grains passed 
through the sieve. The remainder, consisting mainly of pedicels, Aveighed 20 grains. 
Both the 16p grains of powder and the 20 grains of pedicels were placed in a half-pint 
bottle, and 320 grains of Avater and 1000 grains of diluted alcohol added. B 2 , or the 
full-grown seeds, gave a weight in powder and pedicels of 1775 grains, and was treated 
with 320 grains of water and 1000 grains of diluted alcohol. All the bottles, as before, 
were wrapped in brown paper, and placed in a cellar. There they remained till January 
18th, 1867, when tinctures were made from each lot by percolation; a funnel, with the 
throat so obstructed with flax as to deliver a drop about once a minute, being used as a 
percolator. A 3 was first placed in the funnel, and diluted alcohol poured on till a little over 
four ounces of liquid had passed,—that is, till the four-ounce vial used as a receiver was 
filled to a mark on its neck. The tincture obtained was then transferred to the bottle 
in which the leaves had macerated, it having been thoroughly washed and dried—the 
exhausted matter removed from the funnel-—the funnel Avell rinsed and wiped, and half 
an ounce of diluted alcohol passed through to rinse out the obstructing plug, before B 3 
was introduced. In like manner, B 3 , O 3 , D 3 , and A 2 , B 2 , C 2 , and D 2 were treated, the 
funnel being carefully cleansed between the percolations of the several parcels. The 
same amount of tincture was thus obtained from each, made, as nearly as possible, with 
the same menstruum. 
