2 Spec. Plant. Willd. ii. 881. Cl. 11. Ord.3. Dodecandria Trigynia. Nat. ord. Euphorbiaceae. G. 959. Corolla four or five petalled, fixed to the calyx. Calyx one-leafed, ventricose. Capsule tricoccous. * Fruticosae, aculeatae. Species 2. E. Canariensis. Species 7. E. Officinarum.3 E. Antiquorum. Officinal Euphorbium plant. Amoenit. Acad. vol. iii. p. 102. Jackson s Morocco, p. 81. fig.? Kol-Quall, Bruce's Abyssinia, vol. v. p. 41. fig.? Officinal. Euphorbiae gummi resina, Lond. Euphorbium.

Syn. Euphorbe (F.), Euphorbium (G.), Winkel-euphorbium (Dutch), Prus-kada (Swed.), Euforbio (I.), Euphorbio (S.), Saynd kadood (H.), Ukeil Nefsch {Arab.), Nura-shy (Beng.), Shuddraykullu pomt ( Tarn.).

This is a perennial, succulent, shrubby plant, a native of Africa, where it grows in great abundance. The plant described and figured by Bruce under the name of Kol-Quall, and that which Jackson, in his Account of Morocco, says the Arabs and Shellahs call Dergmuse, appear to be the same or varieties of the E. Officinarum. When arrived at maturity it has a simple, erect, round stem, about five feet high; angled or furrowed with eighteen or more longitudinal fissures. From the summit branches are thrown out in every direction, going off first horizontally, and then ascending, so as to give to the whole plant the appearance of the skeleton of a large goblet supported on a stalk or foot. The branches are about an inch in diameter, more distinctly angled than the stem, scolloped, and furnished with prickles everywhere double: it has no leaves, but instead of them, tubercles, adjoining to each pair of prickles. The flowers are sessile, on the extremities of the branches, of a crimson colour. The calyx is of one piece, persistent, with a four or five toothed lip. The petals are four, turbinated, gibbous, thick, truncated, unequal in situation, and fixed by claws to the margin of the calyx.

The filaments are more than twelve, thread-like, longer than the corolla, coming forth at different times, and carrying each two globular anthers: the germen is trigonous, with a simple short style, crowned with three semibifid obtuse stigmas. The capsule is tricoccous, pedicellated, elastic; with round solitary seeds.

1 Canella alba contains no tannin.

2 Antonius Musa and Euphorbus were brothers: the former was physician to Augustus Caesar; the latter to Juba, king of Lybia. Cassar raised a statue to Musa: Juba named this plant after Euphorbus. "Ubi jam Musse statua? Peritt! evanuit! Euphorbi autem perdurat, perennat, nee unquam destrui potest."-Crit. Bot. 9,6.

Dioscoridis.

The succus proprius of all the species of euphorbia is white, and concretes by exposure to the air into a solid substance. The euphorbium brought to this country is said to be the product of some other species, besides the plant we have described: for instance, E. antiquorum and E. Cana-7'iensis of Willdenow. Mr. Jackson says, that in the lower regions of Mount Atlas the inhabitants collect the concreted gum resin, which they call furbiune, in September. It is obtained by making slight incisions in the branches of the plant with a knife, from which a milk-like juice exudes, and forms into tears of an oblong or roundish form. The quantity yielded is so considerable, that the plants are cut once only in four years; the supply then obtained being sufficient for that space of time for all Europe. The recent juice is so corrosive as to erode the skin wherever it touches; and the people who gather the gum are obliged to tie a cloth over the mouth and nostrils, to protect them from the acrid dust of the withered branches, which induces the most violent sneezing.'

Bruce says, "When the tree (Kol-Quall) grows old, the branches wither; and, in place of milk, the inside appears to be full of powder, which is so pungent, that the small dust which I drew upon striking a withered branch seemed to

Euphorbium is imported in serons, each of which contains from 100 to 150 lbs. weight. It is in small, hollow, somewhat forked pieces, which appear as if the euphorbium had concreted round the pedicels of the flowers; and it is often mixed with the tricoccous seeds, and other impurities.

Qualities.-It is inodorous; and when first chewed has little taste, but it soon gives a very acrid, burning impression to the tongue, palate, and throat, which is very permanent, and almost insupportable. Its specific gravity is 1.124. Water, when triturated with it, is rendered milky, but actually dissolves one seventh part only of the quantity employed : alcohol dissolves one fourth part, and affords a clear straw-coloured tincture, which is rendered milky by the addition of water: ether takes up six parts in ten, forming an opaline infusion. When the ethereal tincture is evaporated on water, it leaves on the side of the glass a pellicle of transparent resin, and on the water a cake of opaque adhesive whitish matter, which I found to consist of wax and resin, resembling an officinal plaster; while the water is rendered milky. The acrimony resides in the resinous matter. The analysis of Braconnot1 makes 100 parts of Euphorbium to contain 37.0 of resin, 19.0 wax, 20.5 malate of lime, which was mistaken for gum, 2.0 malate of potassa, 5.0 water, 13.5 woody matter, and 3.0 loss.

He regards the resin as peculiar, from its being insoluble in alkalies, but soluble in the sulphuric and nitric acids.

Medical properties and uses.-Euphorbium possesses powerful cathartic, emetic, errhine, and rubefacient properties. It has been given as a hydragogue in dropsies; but owing to the violence of its effects, its internal use is now exploded : neither as an errhine can it be used alone; for it occasions so much inflammation as to produce haemorrhage from the nostrils, and swell the integuments of the head. When properly diluted, however, with starch or any other inert powder, and cautiously used, it is an effectual and excellent errhine in lethargy, deafness, palsy, amaurosis, and similar cases.