14 
THE PRINCPLES OF BOTANY. 
Now, it would appear that the activity of the drug depends 
mostly upon the bitter principle, seeing that so small a quan¬ 
tity as the eighth of a grain is often a powerful purgative. 
Pereira tells us that 44 Hippocrates mentions that the 
milk of women and goats who have eaten elaterium or wild 
cucumber possesses purgative qualities. Furthermore, the 
accident which occurred to Dr. Robert Dickson, lecturer on 
botany at St. George’s Hospital, seems to prove that absorp¬ 
tion must have taken place by the skin. Dr. Dickson carried 
a specimen of the plant in his hat to his lodgings, in Paris, 
from the Jardin-du-Roi. In half an hour he experienced 
violent headache, which was followed by colicky pains, 
violent purging, vomiting, and fever.” The learned author 
of the 4 Materia Medica ’ further declares that, 44 considered 
with respect to other cathartics, we find it pre-eminently 
distinguished by the violence of its purgative effect. Castor 
oil alone approximates to it. Its hydragogue operation 
exceeds that of most, if not all other, ordinary used drastics.” 
The cucumber fruits of the garden, so grateful to most of us, 
do not always agree with every one, and as some of these, 
curiously enough, take on a bitter taste, it is highly probable 
that they contain a small proportion of elaterium; at all 
events it is usually recommended that the bitter fruits should 
be avoided, and, doubtless, the advice is sound. 
The colocynth of the shops is a kind of gourd which, as 
shown in the druggist’s window, is unpeeled, while the 
gourds in use are usually divested of their outer tegument. 
They are exceedingly bitter, and a watery extract from them 
is much employed as a comparatively mild and safe purga¬ 
tive. The extent of their use may be gathered from the fact 
that in 1839 duty was paid on 10,417 lbs. 
Several officinal preparations have this drug for their basis, 
notably the Extract and the Pilula Colocynthidis composita 
of the pharmacopoeia. It is also used as an enema. It is, 
however, not a little curious to find that the powerful 
medicines derived from this family find no place in the 
veterinarian pharmacopoeia. This probably arises from the 
statements of the uncertainty of its action upon the lower 
animals, for while it is stated by Pereira that its action upon 
dogs appears to be analogous to that on man, according to 
French authorities its operation on horses is comparatively 
slight; but be that as it may, in the bitter cucumber and 
the colocynth there is no doubt we possess plants with most 
active, aye, even amounting to poisonous [qualities; but that 
the many hundreds of varieties of the order are wholesome 
and pleasant will be shown in a future article. 
