The Botanist's Companion Part 19

345. GALEGA officinalis. GOAT'S RUE. The Herb.--This is celebrated as an alexipharmic; but its sensible qualities discover no foundation for any virtues of this kind: the taste is merely leguminous; and in Italy (where it grows wild) it is said to be used as food.

346. GALIUM Aparine. GOOSEGRa.s.s, OR CLEAVERS. The Leaves.--It is recommended as an aperient, and in chronic eruptions; but practice has little regard to it.

347. GALIUM verum. LADIES BEDSTRAW, OR CHEESE-RENNET. The Herb.--This herb has a subacid taste, with a very faint, not disagreeable smell: the juice changes blue vegetable infusions to a red colour, and coagulates milk, thus exhibiting marks of acidity. It stands recommended as a mild styptic, and in epilepsy; but has never been much in use.

348. GERANIUM robertianum. HERB ROBERT. The leaves.--They have an austere taste, and have hence been recommended as astringent: but they have long been disregarded in practice.

349. GLECHOMA hederacea. GROUND-IVY. The Leaves.--This herb is an useful corroborant, aperient, and detergent; and hence stands recommended against laxity, debility, and obstructions of the viscera: some have had a great opinion of it for cleansing and healing ulcers of the internal parts, even of the lungs; and for purifying the blood. It is customary to infuse the dried leaves in malt liquors, to which it readily imparts its virtues; a practice not to be commended, unless it is for the purpose of medicine.

350. HEDERA helix. IVY. The Leaves and Berries.--The leaves have very rarely been given internally; notwithstanding they are recommended (in the Ephem. natur. curios. vol. ii. obs. 120.) against the atrophy of children; their taste is nauseous, acrid, and bitter. Externally they have sometimes been employed for drying and healing ichorous sores, and likewise for keeping issues open. The berries were supposed by the ancients to have a purgative and emetic quality; later writers have recommended them in small doses, as diaph.o.r.etics and alexipharmics; and Mr. Boyle tells us, that in the London plague the powder of them was given with vinegar, with good success, as a sudorific. It is probable the virtue of the composition was rather owing to the vinegar than to the powder.

351. HERNIARIA glabra. RUPTUREWORT. The Leaves.--It is a very mild restringent, and may, in some degree, be serviceable in disorders proceeding from a weak flaccid state of the viscera: the virtue which it has been most celebrated for, it has little t.i.tle to, that of curing hernias.

352. HYPERIc.u.m perforatum. ST. JOHN'S WORT. The Leaves and Flowers.--Its taste is rough and bitterish; the smell disagreeable. Hyperic.u.m has long been celebrated as a corroborant, diuretic, and vulnerary; but more particularly in hysterical and maniacal disorders: it has been reckoned of such efficacy in these last, as to have thence received the name of fuga daemonum.

353. JASMINUM officinale. JASMINE. The Flowers.--The flowers have a strong smell, which is liked by most people, though to some disagreeable: expressed oils extract their fragrance by infusion; and water elevates somewhat of it in distillation, but scarcely any essential oil can be obtained from them: the distilled water, kept for a little time, loses its odour.

354. IRIS Pseudoacorus. FLOWER-DE-LUCE. The Root.--The roots, when recent, have a bitter, acrid, nauseous taste, and taken into the stomach prove strongly cathartic; and hence the juice is recommended in dropsies, in the dose of three or four scruples. By drying they lose this quality, yet still retain a somewhat pungent, bitterish taste: their smell in this state is of the aromatic kind.

355. IRIS florentina. FLORENTINE IRIS, OR ORRIS-ROOT.--The roots grown in this country have neither the odour nor the other qualities that those possess which are grown in warmer climates: so that, for the purposes of medicine, they are usually imported from Leghorn.

The root in its recent state is extremely acrid, and, when chewed, excites a pungent heat in the mouth which continues several hours; but on being dried, this acrimony is almost wholly dissipated, the taste becomes slightly bitter, and the smell approaching to that of violets.

It is now chiefly used in its dried state, and ranked as a pectoral or expectorant. The princ.i.p.al use of the roots is, however, for the purposes of perfumery, for which it is in considerable demand.

356. LACTUCA sativa. GARDEN LETTUCE. The Leaves and Seeds.--It smells strongly of opium, and resembles it in its effects; and its narcotic power, like that of the poppy heads, resides in its milky juice. An extract from the expressed juice is recommended in small doses in dropsy. In those diseases of long standing proceeding from visceral obstructions, it has been given to the extent of half an ounce a-day. It is said to agree with the stomach, to quench thirst, to be greatly laxative, powerfully diuretic, and somewhat diaph.o.r.etic.

357. LAMIUM alb.u.m. WHITE ARCHANGEL, OR DEAD NETTLE. The Flowers.--The flowers have been particularly celebrated in female weaknesses, as also in disorders of the lungs; but they appear to be of very weak powers.

358. LAVENDULA Stoechas. ARABIAN STOECHAS, OR FRENCH LAVEN-DER. The Flowers.--They have a very fragrant smell, and a warm, aromatic, bitterish, subacrid taste: distilled with water, they yield a considerable quant.i.ty of a fragrant essential oil; to rectified spirit it imparts a strong tincture, which insp.i.s.sated proves an elegant aromatic extract, but is seldom used in medicine.

359. LEONURUS Cardiaca. MOTHERWORT. The Leaves.--These have a bitter taste, and a pretty strong smell: they are supposed to be useful in hysteric disorders, to strengthen the stomach, to promote urine; and indeed it may be judged from their smell and taste, that their medical virtues are considerable, though they are now rejected both from the London and Edinburgh Pharmacopoeias.

360. LILIUM candidum. WHITE LILY. The Roots.--These are used in poultices. The good housewife doctors cut the roots in slices and steep them in brandy; and they are said to be an excellent remedy for all bruises and green wounds: for which purposes it is applied by them with considerable effect.

361. LITHOSPERMUM officinale. GROMWELL. The Seeds.--These are roundish, hard, and of a whitish colour, like little pearls. Powdered, they have been supposed peculiarly serviceable in calculous disorders. Their taste is merely farinaceous.

362. LYSIMACHIA Nummularia. MONEYWORT, OR HERB TWOPENCE. The Leaves.-- Their taste is subastringent, and very slightly acid: hence they stand recommended by Boerhaave in the hot scurvy, and in uterine and other haemorrhagies. But their effects are so inconsiderable, that common practice takes no notice of them.

363. MALVA alcea. VERVAIN-MALLOW. The Leaves.--Alcea agrees in quality with the Althaea and Malva vulgaris; but appears to be less mucilaginous than either.

364. MATRICARIA Parthenium. COMMON WILD FEVERFEW. The Leaves and Flowers.--Simon Pauli relates, that he has experienced most happy effects from it in obstructions of the uterine evacuations. I have often seen, says he, from the use of a decoction of Matricaria and chamomile flowers with a little mugwort, hysteric complaints instantly relieved, and the patient from a lethargic state, returned as it were into life again. Matricaria is likewise recommended in sundry other disorders, as a warm stimulating bitter: all that bitters and carminatives can do, says Geoffroy, may be expected from this. It is undoubtedly a medicine of some use in these cases, though not perhaps equal to chamomile flowers alone, with which the Matricaria agrees in sensible qualities, except in being weaker.

365. NEPETA Calamintha. FIELD CALAMINT. The Leaves.--This is a low plant, growing wild about hedges and highways, and in dry sandy soils.

The leaves have a quick warm taste, and smell strongly of pennyroyal: as medicines, they differ little otherwise from spearmint, than in being somewhat hotter, and of a less pleasant odour; which last circ.u.mstance has procured calamint the preference in hysteric cases.

366. NEPETA cataria. NEP, OR CATMINT. The Leaves.--This is a moderately aromatic plant, of a strong smell, not ill resembling a mixture of mint and pennyroyal; it is also recommended in hysteric cases.

367. NIGELLA romana. FENNEL-FLOWER. The Seeds.--They have a strong, not unpleasant smell; and a subacrid, somewhat unctuous disagreeable taste.

They stand recommended as aperient, diuretic, &c. but being suspected to have noxious qualities should be used with caution.

368. NYMPHAEA alba. WHITE WATER-LILY. The Root and Flowers.--These have a rough, bitterish, glutinous taste, (the flowers are the least rough,) and when fresh a disagreeable smell, which is in great measure lost by drying: they are recommended in alvine fluxes, gleets, and the like. The roots are supposed by some to be in an eminent degree narcotic.