380 
Notes  on  Scrophulariacece. 
f  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
1     Aug.  1,  1874. 
In  North  America  many  of  the  Serophularice  are  used  in  medicine. 
Scrophularia  nodosa,  L.,  the  figwort,  a  plant  growing  some  two  or 
three  feet  high,  and  found  in  woods  and  thickets  over  a  good  part  of 
Europe,  was  at  one  time  officinal  in  the  Dublin  Pharmacopoeia,  the 
leaves  being  used  in  the  preparation  of  an  ointment. 
In  some  parts  of  Europe,  as  well  as  in  America,  they  are  occasion- 
ally used,  as  well  as  the  roots,  for  making  poultices  for  ulcers,  tumors, 
burns  and  cutaneous  eruptions.  The  leaves  have  a  rank,  disagree- 
able smell  and  an  acrid,  bitter  case,  and  the  root  has  also  a  nauseous 
odor.  The  leaves  of  this  plant  were,  at  one  time,  supposed  to  have 
tonic,  diaphoretic  and  anthelmintic  properties,  and  were  advocated 
for  the  cure  of  scrofula.  Farmers  occasionally  use  a  decoction  of 
the  leaves  for  curing  scab  in  pigs. 
The  great  mullein,  Verbascum  Thapsus,  L.,  a  well-known  British 
plant,  in  gravelly,  sandy,  or  chalky  soils,  is  common  also  in  neglected 
fields  and  along  roadsides  in  the  United  States.  The  thick,  woolly 
leaves  have  a  mucilaginous,  bitter  taste,  which  is  extracted  by  infu- 
sion in  water.  They  are  demulcent  and  emollient,  and  were  at  one 
time  much  valued,  not  only  in  domestic  practice,  but  by  practitioners 
in  catarrh  and  diarrhoea.  Sir  James  Smith  testifies  to  their  value  in 
the  following  words:  "A  pint  of  cow's  milk,  with  a  handful  of  the 
leaves  of  this  mullein  boiled  in  it  to  half-a-pint,  sweetened,  strained, 
and  taken  at  bed-time,  is  a  pleasant  emollient  and  nutritious  medicine 
for  allaying  a  cough  or  removing  the  pain  and  irritation  of  the  piles." 
The  leaves,  steeped  in  hot  water,  are  not  unfrequently  used  by  coun- 
try people  as  poultices  in  hsemorrhoidal  complaints.  In  Sweden  and 
Norway  a  decoction  of  the  leaves  is  given  to  cattle  suffering  from 
cough  or  pulmonary  diseases.  The  flowers,  it  is  said,  when  dried  in 
the  sun,  give  off  a  fatty  substance,  which  is  used  in  Alsace  as  a  cata- 
plasm. Porcher,  in  his  '  Resources  of  the  Southern  Fields  and  For- 
ests,' thinks  that  sufficient  attention  has  not  been  paid  to  this  plant 
as  a  medicine,  and  strongly  recommends  the  desirability  of  making  a 
careful  analysis.  In  an  enumeration  of  the  uses  to  which  the  plant 
is  put  in  North  America,  he  states  that  the  leaves  steeped  in  hot 
water  are  applied  externally  as  a  feebly  anodyne  emollient  dressing 
for  sores,  for  the  relief  of  headache  and  frontal  pains,  and  are  much 
used  by  the  poorer  classes.  The  leaves  of  this  plant  and  the  bark  of 
the  root  of  sassafras,  in  equal  parts,  boiled  in  water  and  concen- 
trated, then  mixed  with  powdered  sassafras  bark  to  form  pills,  are 
