Chapter XXIX: Part 29

Garcia de Orta[1690] (1563) observed the plant in India, and has narrated that its flowers or seeds are put into food to intoxicate persons it was designed to rob. It was also described by Christoval Acosta, who in his book on Indian drugs[1691] mentions two other varieties, one of them with yellow flowers, the seeds of either being very poisonous, and often administered with criminal intent, as well as for the cure of disease. Graham[1692] says of the plant that it possesses very strong narcotic properties, and has on several occasions been fatally used by Bombay thieves, who have administered it in order to deprive their victims of the power of resistance.

The seeds and fresh leaves have a place in the _Pharmacopœia of India_, 1868.

=Description=—The seeds of _D. alba_ are very different in appearance from those of _D. Stramonium_, being of a light yellowish-brown, rather larger size, irregular in shape and somewhat shrivelled. Their form has been likened to the human ear; they are in fact obscurely triangular or flattened-pearshaped, the rounded end being thickened into a sinuous, convoluted, triple ridge, while the centre of the seed is somewhat depressed. The hilum runs from the pointed end nearly half-way up the length of the seed. The testa is marked with minute rugosities, but is not so distinctly pitted as in the seed of the _D. Stramonium_; it is also more developed, exhibiting in section large intercellular spaces to which are due its spongy texture. The seeds of the two species agree in internal structure as well as in taste; but those of _D. alba_ do not give a fluorescent tincture.

[1688] Seeds of _D. alba_ sent to us from Madras by Dr. Bidie, were sown by our friend M. Naudin of Collioure (Pyrénées Orientales), and produced the plant under three forms, viz.:—1. The true _D. alba_ as figured in Wight’s _Icones_.—2. Plants with flowers, violet without and nearly white within (_D. fastuosa_).—3. Plants with double corollas of large size and of a yellow colour.

[1689] Sontheimer’s translation, i. 269.

[1690] _Aromatum historia_, 1574, lib. 2. c. 24.

[1691] _Tractado de las Drogas ... de las Indias Orientales_, Burgos, 1578. 85.

[1692] _Catalogue of Bombay Plants_, 1839. 141.

The leaves, which are only employed in a fresh state, are 6 to 10 inches in length, with long stalks, ovate, often unequal at the base, acuminate, coarsely dentate with a few spreading teeth. They evolve an offensive odour when handled.

=Microscopic Structure=—The testa is built up of the same tissues as in _D. Stramonium_, but the thick-walled cells constituting the spongy part are far larger, and distinctly show numerous secondary deposits, making a fine object for the microscope.

=Chemical Composition=—Neither the seeds nor the leaves of _D. alba_ have yet been examined chemically, but there can scarcely be any doubt that their very active properties are due to _Daturine_, for the preparation of which the former would probably be the best source.

=Uses=—The seeds in the form of tincture or extract have been employed in India as a sedative and narcotic, and the fresh leaves, bruised and made into a poultice with flour, as an anodyne application.

FOLIA HYOSCYAMI.

_Henbane Leaves_; F. _Feuilles de Jusquiame_; G. _Bilsenkraut_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Hyoscyamus niger_ L., a coarse, erect herb, with soft, viscid, hairy foliage of unpleasant odour, pale yellowish flowers elegantly marked with purple veins, and 5-toothed bottle-shaped calyx. It is found throughout Europe from Portugal and Greece to Central Norway and Finland, in Egypt, Asia Minor, the Caucasus, Persia, Siberia and Northern India. As a weed of cultivation it now grows also in North America[1693] and Brazil. In Britain it occurs wild, chiefly in waste places near buildings; and is cultivated for medicinal use.

Henbane exists under two varieties, known as _annual_ and _biennial_, but scarcely presenting any other distinctive character.

_Biennial Henbane_ (_Hyoscyamus niger_ var. α. _biennis_) is most esteemed for pharmaceutical preparations. It is raised by seed, the plant producing the first year only a rosette of luxuriant stalked leaves, 12 or more inches in length. In the second, it throws up a flower stem of 2 to 3 feet in height, and the whole plant dies as the fruit matures.

_Annual Henbane_ (_H. niger_ var. β. _annua_, vel _agrestis_) is a smaller plant, coming to perfection in a single season. It is the usual wild form, but it is also grown by the herbalists.[1694]

=History=—Hyoscyamus, under which name it is probable the nearly allied South European species, _H. albus_ L., was generally intended, was medicinal among the ancients, and particularly commended by Dioscorides.

In Europe, henbane has been employed from remote times. Benedictus Crispus, archbishop of Milan, in a work written shortly before A.D. 681, notices it under the name of _Hyoscyamus_ and _Symphoniaca_.[1695] In the 10th century, its virtues were particularly recorded by Macer Floridus[1696] who called it _Jusquiamus_.

[1693] It had become naturalized in North America prior to 1672, as we find it mentioned by Josselyn in his _New England’s Rarities discovered_ (Lond. 1672) among the plants “sprung up since the English planted and kept cattle in New England.”

[1694] _Pharm. Journ._ i. (1860) 414.

[1695] S. de Renzi, _Collectio Salernitana_, Napoli, i. (1852) 74. 84.

[1696] _De Viribus Herbarum_, edited by Choulant, Lips. 1832. 108.

Frequent mention is made of it in the Anglo-Saxon works on medicine of the 11th century,[1697] in which it is called _Henbell_, and sometimes _Belene_, the latter word perhaps traceable in βιλινουντία, which Dioscorides[1698] gives as the Gallic designation of the plant. In the 13th century henbane was also used by the Welsh “Physicians of Myddvai.”

The word _Hennibone_, with the Latin and French synonyms _Jusquiamus_ and _Chenille_, occurs in a vocabulary of the 13th century; and _Hennebane_ in a Latin and English vocabulary of the 15th century.[1699] In the _Arbolayre_, a printed French herbal of the 15th century,[1700] we find the plant described as _Hanibane_ or _Hanebane_ with the following explanation—“Elle est aultrement appeler cassilago et aultrement simphoniaca. La semence proprement a nom jusquiame ou hanebane, et herbe a nom cassilago....” Both _Hyoscyamus_ and _Jusquiamus_ are from the Greek Ὑοσκύαμος, i.e. _Hog-bean_.

Though a remedy undeniably potent, henbane in the first half of the last century had fallen into disuse. It was omitted from the London pharmacopœias of 1746 and 1788, and restored only in 1809. Its re-introduction into medicine was chiefly due to the experiments and recommendations of Störck.[1701]

During the middle ages the seeds and roots of henbane were also much used.

=Description=—The stems of henbane, whether of the annual or biennial form, are clothed with soft, viscid, hairy leaves, of which the upper constitute the large, sessile, coarsely toothed bracts of the unilateral flower-spike. The middle leaves are more toothed and subamplexicaul. The lower leaves are stalked, ovate-oblong, coarsely dentate, and of large size. The stems, leaves, and calyces of henbane are thickly beset with long, soft, jointed hairs; the last joint of many of these hairs exudes a viscid substance occasioning the fresh plant to feel clammy to the touch. In the cultivated plant, the hairiness diminishes.

After drying, the broad light-coloured midrib becomes very conspicuous, while the rest of the leaf shrinks much and acquires a greyish green hue. The drug derived from the flowering plant as found in commerce is usually much broken. The fœtid, narcotic odour of the fresh leaves is greatly diminished by drying. The fresh plant has but little taste.

Dried henbane is sold under three forms, which are not however generally distinguished by druggists. These are 1. _Annual plant_, foliage and green tops. 2. _Biennial plant_, leaves of the first year. 3. _Biennial plant_, foliage and green tops. The third form is always regarded as the best, but no attempt has been made to determine with accuracy the relative merits of the three sorts.

[1697] _Leechdoms etc. of Early England_, iii. (1866) 313.

[1698] Lib. iv. c. 69. (ed. Sprengel).

[1699] Wright, _Volume of Vocabularies_, 1857. 141. 265.

[1700] See p. 148, note 3, also Brunet, _Manuel du Libraire_, i. (1860) 377.

[1701] See p. 459, note 5.

=Chemical Composition=—_Hyoscyamine_, the most important among the constituents of henbane, was obtained in an impure state by Geiger and Hesse in 1833. Höhn in 1871 first isolated it from the seeds, which are far richer in it than the leaves.[1702] The seeds are deprived of the fatty oil (26 per cent.) and treated with spirit of wine containing sulphuric acid, which takes out the hyoscyamine in the form of sulphate. The alcohol is then evaporated and tannic acid added; the precipitate thus obtained is mixed with lime and exhausted with alcohol. The hyoscyamine is again converted into a sulphate, the aqueous solution of which is then precipitated with carbonate of sodium, and the alkaloid dissolved by means of ether. After the evaporation of the ether, hyoscyamine remains as an oily liquid which after some time concretes into wart-like tufted crystals, soluble in benzol, chloroform, ether, as well as in water. Höhn and Reichardt assign to hyoscyamine the formula C₁₅H₂₃O₃. The seeds yield of it only 0·05 per cent.

Hyoscyamine is easily decomposed by caustic alkalis. By boiling with baryta in aqueous solution, it is split into _Hyoscine_, C₆H₁₃N, and _Hyoscinic Acid_, C₉H₁₀O₃. The former is a volatile oily liquid of a narcotic odour and alkaline reaction. By keeping it over sulphuric acid it crystallizes and also yields crystallized salts; hyoscine may be closely allied to conine, C₈H₁₅N. Hyoscinic acid, a crystallizable substance having an odour resembling that of empyreumatic benzoic acid.[1703] It melts, according to Höhn, at 105°; tropic acid (see p. 457), melting at 118°, agrees so very nearly with hyoscinic acid that further researches will probably prove these acids to be identical.

Another process for extracting hyoscyamine is due (1875) to Thibaut. He removes by bisulphide of carbon the fatty oil from the powdered seeds, and exhausts them with alcohol slightly acidulated by tartaric acid. The alcohol being distilled off, the author precipitates the alkaloid by means of a solution containing 6 per cent. of iodide of potassium and 3 per cent. iodine. By decomposing the precipitate with sulphurous acid, hydroiodic acid and sulphate of hyoscyamine are formed. The latter is dried up at 35° with magnesia and the hyoscyamine extracted by alcohol or chloroform. The crystals melt at 90°. Thibaut found the alkaloid thus prepared from seeds differing from that yielded by the leaves, the latter having a somewhat strong odour.

Attfield[1704] has pointed out that extract of henbane is rich in nitrate of potassium and other inorganic salts. In the leaves, the amount of nitrate is, according to Thorey,[1705] largest before flowering, and the same observation applies to hyoscyamine.

=Uses=—Henbane in the form of tincture or extract is administered as a sedative, anodyne or hypnotic. The impropriety of giving it in conjunction with free potash or soda, which render it perfectly inert, has been demonstrated by the experiments of Garrod.[1706] Hyoscyamine, like atropine, powerfully dilates the pupil of the eye.

[1702] From the experiments of Schoonbroodt (1868), there is reason to believe that the active principle of henbane can be more easily extracted from the _fresh_ than from the _dried_ plant.

[1703] I have had the opportunity of examining the above substances as prepared by the said chemists.—F. A. F. July 1871.

[1704] _Pharm. Journ._ iii. (1862) 447.

[1705] Wiggers and Husemann, _Jahresbericht_, 1869. 56.

[1706] _Pharm. Journ._ xvii. (1858) 462; xviii. (1859) 174.

=Substitutes=—_Hyoscyamus albus_ L., a more slender plant than _H. niger_ L., with stalked leaves and bracts, a native of the Mediterranean region, is sometimes used in the south of Europe as medicinal henbane. _H. insanus_ Stocks, a plant of Beluchistan, is mentioned in the _Pharmacopœia of India_ as of considerable virulence, and sometimes used for smoking.

FOLIA TABACI.

_Herba Nicotianæ_; _Tobacco_; F. _Tabac_; G. _Tabakblätter_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Nicotiana Tabacum_ L.—The common Tobacco plant is a native of the New World, though not now known in a wild state. Its cultivation is carried on in most temperate and subtropical countries.

=History=—It is stated by C. Ph. von Martius[1707] that the practice of smoking tobacco has been widely diffused from time immemorial among the natives of South America, as well as among the inhabitants of the valley of the Mississippi as far north as the plant can be cultivated.

The Spaniards became acquainted with tobacco when they landed in Cuba in 1492, and on their return introduced it into Europe for the sake of its medicinal properties. The custom of inhaling the smoke of the herb was learnt from the Indians, and by the end of the 16th century had become generally known throughout Spain and Portugal, whence it passed into the rest of Europe, and into Turkey, Egypt, and India, notwithstanding that it was opposed by the severest enactments both of Christian and Mahommedan governments. It is commonly believed that the practice of smoking tobacco was much promoted in England, as well as in the north of Europe generally, by the example of Sir Walter Raleigh and his companions.

Tobacco was introduced into China, probably by way of Japan or Manila, during the 16th or 17th century, but its use was prohibited by the emperors both of the Ming and Tsing dynasties. It is now cultivated in most of the provinces, and is universally employed.[1708]

The first tolerably exact description of the tobacco plant is that given by Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés, governor of St. Domingo, in his _Historia general de las Indias_,[1709] printed at Seville in 1535. In this work, the plant is said to be smoked through a branched tube of the shape of the letter =Y=, which the natives call _Tabaco_.

It was not until the middle of the 16th century that growing tobacco was seen in Europe,—first at Lisbon, whence the French ambassador, Jean Nicot, sent seeds to France in 1560 as those of a valuable medicinal plant, which was even then diffused throughout Portugal.[1710]

Monardes,[1711] writing in 1571, speaks of tobacco as brought to Spain a few years previously, and valued for its beauty and for its medicinal virtues. Of the latter he gives a long account, noticing also the methods of smoking and chewing the herb prevalent among the Indians. He also supplies a small woodcut representing the plant, which he states to have white flowers, red in the centre.

[1707] _Beiträge zur Ethnographie und Sprachenkunde Americas, zumal Brasiliens_, i. (1867) 719.

[1708] Mayers in _Hong Kong Notes and Queries_, May, 1867; F. P. Smith, _Mat. Med. and Nat. Hist. of China_, 1871. 219.

[1709] Lib. v. c. 2.

[1710] Nicot, _Thrésor de la langue Françoyse_, Paris, 1606. 429.

[1711] _Segunda parte del libro de las cosas que se traen de nuestras Indias occidentales, que sirven al uso de medicina._ Do se trata del Tabaco ..., Sevilla, 1571, 3.

Jacques Gohory,[1712] who cultivated the plant in Paris at least as early as 1572, describes its flowers as shaded with red, and enumerates various medicinal preparations made from it.

In the _Maison Rustique_ of Charles Estienne, edition of 1583, the author gives a “_Discours sur la Nicotiane ou Petum mascle_,” in which he claims for the plant the first place among medicinal herbs, on account of its singular and almost divine virtues.

The cultivation of tobacco in England, except on a very small scale in a physic garden, has been prohibited by law[1713] since 1660.

=Description=—Amongst the various species of _Nicotiana_ cultivated for the manufacturing of smoking tobacco and snuff, _N. Tabacum_ is by far the most frequent, and is almost the only one named in the pharmacopœias as medicinal. Its simple stem, bearing at the summit a panicle of tubular pink flowers, and growing to the height of a man, has oblong, lanceolate simple leaves, with the margin entire. The lower leaves, more broadly lanceolate, and about 2 feet long by 6 inches wide, are shortly stalked. The stem-leaves are semi-amplexicaul, and decurrent at the base. Cultivation sometimes produces cordate-ovate forms of leaf, or a margin more or less uneven, or nearly revolute.

All the herbaceous parts of the plant are clothed with long soft hairs, made up of broad, ribbon-like, striated cells, the points of which exude a glutinous liquid. Small sessile glands are situated here and there on the surface of the leaf.[1714] The lateral veins proceed from the thick midrib in straight lines, at angles of 40° to 75°, gently curving upwards only near the edge. In drying, the leaves become brittle and as thin as paper, and always acquire a brown colour. Even by the most careful treatment of a single leaf, it is not possible to preserve the green hue.

The smell of the fresh plant is narcotic; its taste bitter and nauseous. The characteristic odour of dried tobacco is developed during the process of curing.

=Chemical Composition=—The active principle of tobacco, first isolated in 1828 by Posselt and Reimann, is a volatile, highly poisonous alkaloid termed _Nicotine_, C₁₀H₁₄N₂. It is easily extracted from tobacco by means of alcohol or water, as a malate, from which the alkaloid can be separated by shaking it with caustic lye and ether. The ether is then expelled by warming the liquid, which finally has to be mixed with slaked lime and distilled in a stream of hydrogen, when the nicotine begins to come over at about 200° C.

[1712] _Instruction sur l’herbe Petum ditte en France l’herbe de la Royne ou Médicée_ ... Paris, 1572.

[1713] 12 Car. II. c. 34; 15 Car. II. c. 7.—For further information on the history of tobacco, see Tiedemann, _Geschichte des Tabaks_, Frankfurt, 1854.—We have not consulted Fairholt, _Tobacco, its History_, Lond. 1859.

[1714] Microscopic structure of tobacco leaves. See Pocklington, _Pharm. Journal_, v. (1874) 301.

Nicotine is a colourless oily liquid, of sp. gr. 1·027 at 15° C., deviating the plane of polarization to the left; it boils at 247° and does not concrete even at -10° C. It has a strongly alkaline reaction, an unpleasant odour, and a burning taste. It quickly assumes a brown colour on exposure to air and light; and appears even to undergo an alteration by repeated distillation in an atmosphere deprived of oxygen. Nicotine dissolves in water, but separates on addition of caustic potash; it occurs in the dried leaves to the extent of about 6 per cent., but is subject to great variation. The seeds of tobacco are stated by Kosutany[1715] as grown in Hungary to contain from 0·28 to 0·67 per cent. of the alkaloid.

It has not been met with in tobacco-smoke by Vohl and Eulenberg (1871), though other chemists assert its occurrence. The vapours were found by the former to contain numerous basic substances of the picolinic series, and ceded to caustic potash, hydrocyanic acid,[1716] sulphuretted hydrogen, several volatile fatty acids, phenol and creasote. There was further observed in the imperfect combustion of tobacco the formation of laminæ fusible at 94° C., and having a composition C₁₉H₁₈. Oxide of carbon is also largely met with.

Tobacco leaves, whether fresh or dried, yield when distilled with water a turbid distillate in which, as observed by Hermbstädt in 1823, there are formed, after some days, crystals of _Nicotianin_ or _Tobacco Camphor_. According to J. A. Barral, nicotianin contains 7·12 per cent. of nitrogen (?). By submitting 4 kilogrammes of good tobacco of the previous year to distillation with much water, we obtained nicotianin, floating on the surface of the distillate, in the form of minute acicular crystals, which we found to be devoid of action on polarized light. The crystals have no peculiar taste, at least in the small quantity we tried; they have a tobacco-like smell, perhaps simply due to the water adhering to them. When an attempt was made to separate them by a filter, they entirely disappeared, being probably dissolved by an accompanying trace of essential oil. The clear water showed an alkaline reaction partly due to _nicotine_; this was proved by adding a solution of tannic acid, which caused a well-marked turbidity. Nicotianine is in our opinion a fatty acid contaminated with a little volatile oil as in the case of Capsicum (see page 454), or Iris (see article Rhizome Iridis).

Among the ordinary constituents of leaves, tobacco contains albumin, resin and gum. In smoking, these substances, as well as the cellulose of the thick midrib, would yield products not agreeable to the consumer. The manufacturer therefore discards the midrib, and endeavours by further preparation to ensure at least the partial destruction of these unwelcome constituents, as well as the formation of certain products of fermentation (ferment-oils), which may perhaps contribute to the aroma of tobacco, especially when saccharine substances, liquorice, or alcohol, are added in the maceration to which tobacco is subjected.

Tobacco leaves are remarkably rich in inorganic constituents, the proportion varying from 16 to 27 per cent. According to Boussingault, they contain when dry about 1 per cent. of phosphoric acid, and from 3 to 5 per cent. of potash, together with 2½ to 4½ per cent. of nitrogen partly in the form of nitrate, so that to enable the tobacco plant to flourish, it must have a rich soil or continual manuring.[1717]

[1715] Dragendorff’s _Jahresbericht_, 1874. 98.

[1716] Poggiale and Marty (1870) stated hydrocyanic acid to be absent.

[1717] For further particulars on the chemistry of tobacco cultivation see Boussingault, _Ann. de Chim. et de Phys._ ix. (1866) 50.

The lime, amounting to between a quarter and a half of the entire quantity of ash, is in the leaf combined with organic acids, especially malic, perhaps also citric. The proportion of potash varies greatly, but may amount to about 30 per cent. of the ash.

=Commerce=—There were imported into the United Kingdom in the year 1872, 45,549,700 lb. of unmanufactured tobacco, rather more than half of which was derived from the United States of America. The total value of the commodity thus imported was £1,563,382; and the duty levied upon the quantity retained for home consumption amounted to £6,694,037. In 1876 the consumption of tobacco had increased to 47,000,000 lb., _i.e._ 1½ lb. per head of the population.

In the United States 559,049 acres of land being in 1875 under cultivation with tobacco yielded a crop of 367,000,000 lb.

=Uses=—Tobacco has some reputation in the removal of alvine obstructions, but it is a medicine of great potency and is very rarely used.

=Substitutes=—Of the other species of _Nicotiana_ cultivated as _Tobacco_, _N. rustica_ L. is probably the most extensively grown. It is easily distinguished by its greenish yellow flowers, and its stalked ovate leaves. In spite of their coarser texture, the leaves dry more easily than those of _N. Tabacum_, and with some care may even be made to retain their green colour. _N. rustica_ furnishes _East Indian Tobacco_, also the kinds known as _Latakia_ and _Turkish Tobacco_.

_N. persica_ Lindl. yields the tobacco of Shiraz. _N. quadrivalvis_ Pursh, _N. multivalvis_ Lindl. and _N. repanda_ Willd. are also cultivated plants, the last named, a plant of Havana, being used in the manufacture of a much valued kind of cigar.

SCROPHULARIACEÆ.

FOLIA DIGITALIS.

_Foxglove Leaves_; F. _Feuilles de Digitale_; G. _Fingerhutblätter_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Digitalis purpurea_ L., an elegant and stately plant, common throughout the greater part of Europe, but preferring siliceous soils and generally absent from limestone districts. It is found on the edges of woods and thickets, on bushy ground and commons, becoming a mountain plant in the warm parts of Europe. It occurs in the island of Madeira, in Portugal, Central and Southern Spain, Northern Italy, France, Germany, the British Isles and Southern Sweden, and in Norway as far as 63° N. lat.; it is however very unequally distributed, and is altogether wanting in the Swiss Alps and the Jura.[1718] As a garden plant it is well known.

=History=—The Welsh “Physicians of Myddvai” appear to have frequently made use of foxglove for the preparation of external medicines.[1719] Fuchs[1720] and Tragus[1721] figured the plant; the former gave it the name of _Digitalis_, remarking that up to the time at which he wrote, there was none for the plant in either Greek or Latin. At that period it was regarded as a violent medicine. Parkinson recommended it in 1640 in the “Theatrum botanicum,” and it had a place in the London Pharmacopœia of 1650 and in several subsequent editions. The investigation of its therapeutic powers (1776-9) and its introduction into modern practice are chiefly due to Withering, a well-known English botanist and physician.[1722]

[1718] Dr. R. Cunningham found (1868) _Digitalis purpurea_ completely naturalized about San Carlos in the Island of Chiloe in Southern Chili.

[1719] _Meddygon Myddfai_ (see Appendix) in many places.

[1720] _De Hist. Stirpium_, 1542. 892.

[1721] _De Stirpium ... nomenclaturis_, etc. 1552—“_Campanula sylvestris seu Digitalis_.”

[1722] Withering (William), _Account of the Foxglove_, Birmingham, 1785. 8°.

The word _foxglove_ is said to be derived from the Anglo-Saxon _Foxes-glew_, i.e. _fox-music_, in allusion to an ancient musical instrument consisting of bells hung on an arched support.[1723] In the Scandinavian idioms the plant bears likewise the name of _foxes bell_.

=Description=—Foxglove is a biennial or perennial, the leaves of which ought to be taken from the plant while in full flower. The lower leaves are ovate with the lamina running down into a long stalk; those of the stem become gradually narrower, passing into ovate-lanceolate with a short broadly-winged stalk, or are sessile. All have the margin crenate, crenate-dentate, or sub-serrate, are more or less softly pubescent or nearly glabrous on the upper side, much paler and densely pubescent on the under, which is marked with a prominent network of veins. The principal veins diverge at a very acute angle from the midrib, which is thick and fleshy. The lower leaves are often a foot or more long, by 5 to 6 inches broad; those of the stem are smaller.

When magnified, the tip of each crenature or serrature of the leaf is seen to be provided with a small, shining, wart-like gland. The hairs of the lower surface are simple, and composed of jointed cells which flatten in drying; those of the upper surface are shorter.

In preparing foxglove for medicinal use, it is the custom of some druggists to remove the whole of the petiole and the thicker part of the midrib, retaining only the thin lamina, which is dried with a gentle heat.[1724] The fresh leaf has when bruised an unpleasant herbaceous smell, which in drying becomes agreeable and tea-like. The dried leaf has a very bitter taste.

=Chemical Composition=—Since the beginning of the present century, numerous attempts have been made to prepare the active principle of foxglove, and the name _Digitalin_ has been successively bestowed on widely different substances.

Among the investigators engaged in these researches, we may point out Walz (1846-1858), Kosmann (1845-46, 1860), Homolle partly with Quévenne (1845-61), Nativelle (1872), and especially Schmiedeberg (1874).[1725] The latter has prepared a new, well-defined, crystallizable principle, _Digitoxin_, from Digitalis. He exhausted with water the leaves previously dried and powdered, and then extracted them repeatedly with dilute alcohol, 50 per cent.; the tincture thus obtained was then mixed with basic acetate of lead as long as it produced a precipitate. The latter being separated, the filtered liquid was concentrated and the deposit now formed, after some days, removed from the aqueous liquid. It was then washed with a dilute solution of carbonate of sodium, by which a yellow matter (_chrysophan_?) was partly removed. The substance was then dried, and yielded to chloroform a brownish mass, which after the chloroform had been driven off, was purified by benzin. This liquid dissolved the remainder of the yellow or orange matter, and a little fat, leaving crude digitoxin, which is to be purified by recrystallization from warm alcohol, 80 per cent., adding a little charcoal. This purification still yields yellowish crystals, which ought to be washed again with carbonate of sodium, ether or benzin, and then recrystallized from warm absolute alcohol, containing a little chloroform. This process, however, will only afford colourless crystals provided it be so performed as to cause the separation of digitoxin on account of the cooling of the solution, not by the evaporation of the solvent. If the liquid is instead allowed to evaporate it will soon assume a darker coloration. In the way just pointed out, perfectly colourless scales or needle-shaped crystals of pure digitoxin are at length formed, the yield being not more considerable than about _one_ part from 10,000 of dried leaves.

[1723] Prior, _Popular Names of British Plants_, ed. 2. 1870. 84.

[1724] This method of preparing the leaf was directed in the London Pharmacopœia of 1851, but it had long been in use. No particular directions are given in the British Pharmacopœia.

[1725] For further particulars on Schmiedeberg’s very elaborate researches, the reader may consult my abstract of them in _Pharm. Journ._ v. (1875) 741.—F. A. F..

Digitoxin is insoluble in water, to which it does not even impart its intensely bitter taste as displayed in the alcoholic solution. It is likewise insoluble in benzin or bisulphide of carbon, very sparingly soluble in ether, more abundantly so in chloroform, the latter liquid however acting but very slowly on digitoxin. Its best solvent is alcohol, either cold or warm. The composition of digitoxin answers to the formula, C₃₁H₃₃O₇.

Digitoxin warmed with concentrated hydrochloric acid assumes a yellow or greenish hue, the same which is commonly attributed to commercial “digitalin.” Digitoxin is not a saccharogenous matter; in alcoholic solution it is decomposed by dilute acids, and then affords _Toxiresin_, an uncrystallizable, yellowish substance, which may easily be separated on account of its ready solubility in ether; it appears to be produced also if digitoxin is maintained for some time in the state of fusion at about 240° C. Toxiresin proved to be a very powerful poison, acting energetically on the heart and muscles of frogs. The very specific action of foxglove is due—_not_ exclusively—to digitoxin; it is so highly poisonous that Schmiedeberg thinks it not at all fit for medicinal use, which might rather be confined to other constituents of foxglove, as, for instance, to those obtained from the seeds under the names of digitalin and digitaléin. The latter, however, are of more difficult extraction than digitoxin.

The preparation of digitoxin is similar to that of _Nativelle’s_ crystallized “digitalin;” the former as well as paradigitogenin[1726] are largely found in Nativelle’s digitalin.

[1726] A derivative of _digitoxin_ as extracted by Schmiedeberg from the seeds of foxglove.

The _Digitalin of Nativelle_—The researches on digitalis of this chemist, for which the Orfila prize of 6000 francs was awarded in 1872, have resulted in the extraction of a crystallized preparation possessing active medicinal properties. It may be obtained by the following process:—

The leaves, previously exhausted by water, are extracted by means of alcohol, sp. gr. ·930. The tincture is concentrated until its weight is equal to that of the leaves used, and then diluted by adding thrice its weight of water. A pitch-like deposit is then formed; _digitaléin_ and other substances remaining in solution. The deposit dried on blotting paper is boiled with double its weight of alcohol, sp. gr. ·907; on cooling, crystals are slowly deposited during some days. They should be washed with a little diluted alcohol (·958) and dried: to purify them, they should be first recrystallized from chloroform, and subsequently from boiling alcohol sp. gr. ·828, some charcoal being used at the same time. Digitalin is thus obtained in _colourless needle-shaped crystals_. It assumes an intense emerald green colour when moistened with hydrochloric acid, and has an extremely bitter taste. On the animal economy, it displays all the peculiar effects of digitalis, the dose of a milligramme taken by an adult person once or twice a day occasioning somewhat alarming symptoms, but smaller doses exhibiting the sedative power of the herb.

Another body occurring in foxglove is the crystallizable sugar called _Inosite_, which was detected by Marmé in the leaves, as well as in those of dandelion (p. 394). Pectic matters are also present in foxglove leaves.

=Uses=—Foxglove is a very potent drug, having the effect of reducing the frequency and force of the heart’s action, and hence is given in special cases as a sedative; it is also employed as a diuretic.

=Adulteration=—The dried leaves of some other plants have occasionally been supplied for those of foxglove. Such are the leaves of _Verbascum_, which are easily recognized by their thick coat of branched stellate hairs; of _Inula Conyza_ DC. and _I. Helenium_ L., which have the margin almost entire, and in the latter plant the veins diverging nearly at a right angle from the midrib; in both plants the under side of the leaf is less strongly reticulated than in foxglove. But to avoid all chance of mistake, it is desirable that druggists should purchase the _fresh flowering plant_, which cannot be confounded with any other, and strip and dry the leaves for themselves.

ACANTHACEÆ.

HERBA ANDROGRAPHIDIS.

_Kariyát or Creyat._

=Botanical Origin=—_Andrographis[1727] paniculata_ Nees ab E. (_Justicia Burm._), an annual herb, 1 to 2 feet high, common throughout India, growing under the shade of trees. It is found likewise in Ceylon and Java, and has been introduced into the West Indies. In some districts of India it is cultivated.

[1727] _Andrographis_ from δνὴρ and γραϕὶς, in allusion to the brush-like anther and filament.—Fig. in Bentley and Trimen’s _Med. Plants_, part 23 (1877).

=History=—It is probable that in ancient Hindu medicine this plant was administered indiscriminately with chiretta, which, with several other species of _Ophelia_, is known in India by nearly the same vernacular names. Ainslie asserts that it was a component of a famous bitter tincture called by the Portuguese of India _Droga amara_; but on consulting the authority he quotes[1728] we find that the bitter employed in that medicine was _Calumba_. _Andrographis_ is known in Bengal as _Mahā-tīta_, literally _king of bitters_, from the Sanskrit tikta, “bitter,” a title of which it has been thought so far deserving that it has been admitted to a place in the _Pharmacopœia of India_.

=Description=—The straight, knotty branch stems are obtusely quadrangular, about ¼ of an inch thick at the base, of a dark green colour and longitudinally furrowed. The leaves are opposite, petiolate, lanceolate, entire, the largest ½ an inch or more wide and 3 inches long. Their upper surface is dark green, the under somewhat lighter, and as seen under a lens finely granular. The leaves are very thin, brittle, and, like the stems, entirely glabrous.

In the well-dried specimen before us, for which we are indebted to Dr. G. Bidie of Madras, flowers are wanting and only a few roots are present. The latter are tapering and simple, emitting numerous thin rootlets, greyish externally, woody and whitish within. The plant is inodorous and has a persistent pure bitter taste.

=Chemical Composition=—The aqueous infusion of the herb exhibits a slight acid reaction, and has an intensely bitter taste, which appears due to an indifferent, non-basic principle, for the usual reagents do not indicate the presence of an alkaloid. Tannic acid on the other hand produces an abundant precipitate, a compound of itself with the bitter principle. The infusion is but little altered by the salts of iron; it contains a considerable quantity of chloride of sodium.

=Uses=—Employed as a pure bitter tonic like quassia, gentian, or chiretta, with the last of which it is sometimes confounded.

SESAMEÆ.

OLEUM SESAMI.

_Sesamé Oil_, _Gingeli_, _Gingili_ or _Jinjili Oil_, _Til_ or _Teel Oil_, _Benné Oil_; F. _Huile de Sésame_; G. _Sesamöl_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Sesamum indicum_ DC., an erect, pubescent annual herb, 2 to 4 feet high,[1729] indigenous to India, but propagated by cultivation throughout the warmer regions of the globe, and not now found anywhere in the wild state. In Europe, _Sesamum_ is only grown in some districts of Turkey and Greece, and on a small scale in Sicily and in the islands of Malta and Gozo. It does not succeed well even in the South of France.

[1728] Paolino da San Bartolomeo, _Voyage to the East Indies_ (1776-1789), translated from the German, Lond. 1800; pp. 14. 409.

[1729] Fig. in Bentley and Trimen’s _Med. Plants_, part 23 (1877).

=History=—Sesamé is a plant which we find on the authority of the most ancient documents of Egyptian, Hebrew,[1730] Sanskrit, Greek, and Roman literature, has been used by mankind for the sake of its oily seeds from the earliest times. The Egyptian name _Semsemt_ already occurring in the Papyrus Ebers, is still existing in the Coptic _Semsem_, the Arabic _Simsim_, and the modern _Sesamum_. The Indian languages have their own terms for it, the Hindustani _Til_, from the Sanskrit _Tila_, being one of the best known.[1731] _Tila_ already occurs in the Vedic literature. In the days of Pliny the oil was an export from Sind to Europe by way of the Red Sea, precisely as the seeds are at the present day.

During the middle ages the plant, then known as _Suseman_ or _Sempsen_, was cultivated in Cyprus, Egypt and Sicily; the oil was an article of import from Alexandria to Venice. Joachim Camerarius gave a good figure of the plant in his “Hortus medicus et philosophicus” 1588 (tab. 44). In modern times sesame oil gave way to that of olives, yet at present it is an article which, if not so renowned, is at least of far greater consumption.

=Production=—The plant comes to perfection within 3 or 4 months; its capsule contains numerous flat seeds, which are about ²/₁₀10 of an inch long by ¹/₂₀ thick, and weigh on an average ¹/₁₆ of a grain. To collect them, the plant when mature is cut down, and stacked in heaps for a few days, after which it is exposed to the sun during the day, but collected again into heaps at night. By this process the capsules gradually ripen and burst, and the seeds fall out.[1732]

The plant is found in several varieties affording respectively white, yellowish, reddish, brown or black seeds. The dark seeds may be deprived of a part of their colouring matter by washing, which is sometimes done with a view to obtain a paler oil.[1733]

We obtained from yellowish seeds 56 per cent. of oil; on a large scale, the yield varies with the variety of seed employed and the process of pressing, from 45 to 50 per cent.

=Description=—The best kinds of sesamé oil have a mild agreeable taste, a light yellowish colour, and scarcely any odour; but in these respects the oil is liable to vary with the circumstances already mentioned. The white seeds produced in Sind are reputed to yield the finest oil.

We prepared some oil by means of ether, and found it to have a sp. gr. of 0·919 at 23° C.; it solidified at 5° C., becoming rather turbid at some degrees above this temperature. Yet sesame oil is more fluid at ordinary temperatures than ground-nut oil, and is less prone to change by the influence of the air. It is in fact, when of fine quality, one of the less alterable oils.

[1730] Isaiah xxviii. 27.

[1731] The word _Gingeli_ (or _Gergelim_), which Roxburgh remarks was (as it is now) in common use among Europeans, derives from the Arabic _chulchulân_, denoting sesame seed in its husks before being reaped (Dr. Rice). The word _Benné_ is, we believe, of West African origin, and has no connection with _Ben_, the name of _Moringa_.

[1732] For further particulars see Buchanan, _Journey from Madras through Mysore, etc._ i. (1807) 95. and ii. 224.

[1733] This curious process is described in the _Reports of Juries_, _Madras Exhibition_, 1856, p. 31.—That the colouring matter of the seeds is actually soluble in water is confirmed by Lépine of Pondicherry as we have learnt from his manuscript notes presented to the Musée des Produits des Colonies de France at Paris. The seeds may even be used as a dye.

=Chemical Composition=—The oil is a mixture of olein, stearin and other compounds of glycerin with acids of the fatty series. We prepared with it in the usual way a lead plaster, and treated the latter with ether in order to remove the oleate of lead. The solution was then decomposed by sulphuretted hydrogen, evaporated and exposed to hyponitric vapours. By this process we obtained 72·6 per cent. of _Elaïdic Acid_. The specimen of sesamé oil prepared by ourselves consequently contained 76·0 per cent. of olein, inasmuch as it must be supposed to be present in the form of triolein. In commercial oils the amount of olein is certainly not constant.

As to the solid part of the oil, we succeeded in removing fatty acids, freely melting, after repeated crystallizations, at 67° C., which may consist of stearic acid mixed with one or more of the allied homologous acids, as palmitic and myristic. By precipitating with acetate of magnesium, as proposed by Heintz, we finally isolated acids melting at 52·5 to 53°, 62 to 63°, and 69·2° C., which correspond to myristic, palmitic and stearic acids.

The small proportion of solid matter which separates from the oil on congelation cannot be removed by pressure, for even at many degrees below the freezing point it remains as a soft magma. In this respect sesamé oil differs from that of olive.

Sesamé oil contains an extremely small quantity of a substance, perhaps resinoid, which has not yet been isolated. It may be obtained in solution by repeatedly shaking 5 volumes of the oil with one of glacial acetic acid. If a cold mixture of equal weights of sulphuric and nitric acids is added in like volume, the acetic solution acquires a greenish yellow hue. The same experiment being made with spirit of wine substituted for acetic acid, the mixture assumes a blue colour, quickly changing to greenish yellow. The oil itself being gently shaken with sulphuric and nitric acids, takes a fine green hue, as shown in 1852 by Behrens, who at the same time pointed out that no other oil exhibits this reaction. It takes place even with the bleached and perfectly colourless oil. Sesamé oil added to other oils, if to a larger extent than 10 per cent., may be recognised by this test. The reaction ought to be observed with small quantities, say 1 gramme of the oil and 1 gramme of the acid mixture, previously cooled.

=Commerce=—The commercial importance of Sesamé may be at once illustrated by the fact that France imported in 1870, 83 millions; in 1871, 57½ millions; and 1872, 50 millions of kilogrammes (984,693 cwt.) of the seed.[1734]

The quantity shipped from British India in the year 1871-72 was 565,854 cwt., of which France took no less than 495,414 cwt.[1735] The imports of the seed into the United Kingdom in 1870 were to the value of only about £13,000.

Sesamé is extensively produced in Corea and in the Chinese island of Formosa, which in 1869 exported the exceptionally large quantity of 46,000 peculs[1736] (1 pecul = 133 lb.). Zanzibar and Mozambique also furnish considerable quantities of sesamé, whilst on the West Coast of Africa the staple oil-seed is Ground-nut (_Arachis hypogæa_ L. p. 186). The chief place for the manufacture of sesamé oil is Marseilles.

[1734] _Documents Statistiques réunis par l’Administration des Douanes sur le commerce de la France_, année 1872.

[1735] _Statement of the Trade and Navigation of British India with Foreign Countries_, Calcutta, 1872. 62.

[1736] _Reports on Trade at the Treaty Ports in China for 1870_, Shanghai, 1871. 81.

=Uses=—Good sesamé oil might be employed without disadvantage for all the purposes for which olive oil is used.[1737] As its congealing point is some degrees below that of olive oil, it is even more fitted for cool climates. Sesamé seeds are largely consumed as food both in India and Tropical Africa. The foliage of the plant abounds in mucilage, and in the United States is sometimes used in the form of poultice.

LABIATÆ.

FLORES LAVANDULÆ.

_Lavender Flowers_; F. _Fleurs de Lavande_; G. _Lavendelblumen_.

=Botanical Origin=—_Lavandula vera_ DC., a shrubby plant growing in the wild state from 1 to 2 feet high, but attaining 3 feet or more under cultivation. It is indigenous to the mountainous regions of the countries bordering the western half of the Mediterranean basin. Thus it occurs in Eastern Spain, Southern France (extending northward to Lyons and Dauphiny), in Upper Italy, Corsica, Calabria and Northern Africa,—on the outside of the olive region.[1738] In cultivation it grows very well in the open air throughout the greater part of Germany and as far north as Norway and Livonia; the northern plant would even appear to be more fragrant, according to Schübeler.[1739]

=History=—There has been much learned investigation in order to identify lavender in the writings of the classical authors, but the result has not been satisfactory, and no allusion has been found which unquestionably refers either to _L. vera_ or to _L. Spica_,[1740] whereas _L. Stœchas_ was perfectly familiar to the ancients.

The earliest mention of lavender that we have observed, occurs in the writings of the abbess Hildegard,[1741] who lived near Bingen on the Rhine during the 12th century, and who in a chapter _De Lavendula_ alludes to the strong odour and many virtues of the plant. In a poem of the school of Salerno entitled _Flos Medicinæ_[1742] occur the following lines:—

“Salvia, castoreum, _lavendula_, primula veris,
Nasturtium, athanas hæc sanant paralytica membra.”

In 1387 cushions of satin were made for King Charles VI. of France, to be stuffed with “_lavende_.”[1743] Its use was also popular at an early period in the British isles, for we find “_Llafant_” or “_Llafanllys_” mentioned among the remedies of the “Physicians of Myddvai.”[1744] And in Walton’s “Description of an inn,” about the year 1680 to 1690, we find the walls stuck round with ballads, where the sheets smelt of _lavender_....[1745]

[1737] For pharmaceutical uses, the larger proportion of olein and consequent lesser tendency to solidify, should be remembered.

[1738] On Mont Ventoux near Avignon, the region of _Lavandula vera_ is comprised, according to Martins, between 1500 and 4500 feet above the sea-level.—_Ann. des Sc. Nat._, Bot. x. (1838) 145. 149.

[1739] _Pflanzenwelt Norwegens_, Christiania (1873-1875) 26O.

[1740] F. de Gingins-Lassaraz, _Hist. des Lavandes_, Genève et Paris, 1826.

[1741] _Opera Omnia_, accurante J. P. Migne, Paris, 1855. 1143.

[1742] S. de Renzi, _Collectio Salernitana_, Napoli, i. 417-516.

[1743] Douët d’Arcq, _Comptes de l’Argenterie des rois de France_, ii. (1874) 148.

[1744] _Meddygon Myddfai_ (see Appendix) 287.

[1745] Macaulay, _Hist. of England_, i. ch. 3, Inns.

Lavender was well known to the botanist of the 16th century.

=Description=—The flowers of Common Lavender are produced in a lax terminal spike, supported on a long naked stalk. They are arranged in 6 to 10 whorls (verticillasters), the lowest being generally far remote from those above it. A whorl consists of two cymes, each having, when fully developed, about three flowers, below which is a rhomboidal acuminate bract, as well as several narrow smaller bracts belonging to the particular flowers. The calyx is tubular, contracted towards the mouth, marked with 13 nerves and 5-toothed, the posterior tooth much larger than the others. The corolla of a violet colour is tubular, two-lipped, the upper lip with two, the lower with three lobes. Both corolla and calyx, as well as the leaves and stalks, are clothed with a dense tomentum of stellate hairs, amongst which minute shining oil-glands can be seen by the aid of a lens.

The flowers emit when rubbed a delightful fragrance, and have a pleasant aromatic taste. The leaves of the plant are oblong linear, or lanceolate, revolute at the margin and very hoary when young.

For pharmaceutical use or as a perfume, lavender flowers are stripped from the stalks and dried by a gentle heat. They are but seldom kept in the shops, being grown almost entirely for the sake of their essential oil.

=Production of Essential Oil=—Lavender is cultivated in the parishes of Mitcham, Carshalton and Beddington and a few adjoining localities, all in Surrey, to the extent of about 300 acres. It is also grown at Market Deeping in Lincolnshire; also at Hitchin in Hertfordshire, where lavender was apparently cultivated as early as the year 1568.[1746]

At the latter place there were in 1871 about 50 acres so cropped.

The plants which are of a small size, and grown in rows in dry open fields, flower in July and August. The flowers are usually cut with the stalks of full length, tied up in mats, and carried to the distillery there to await distillation. This is performed in the same large stills that are used for peppermint. The flowers are commonly distilled with the stalks as gathered, and either fresh, or in a more or less dry state. A few cultivators distill only the flowering heads, thereby obtaining a superior product. Still more rarely, the flowers are stripped from the stalks, and the latter rejected _in toto_.[1747] According to the careful experiments of Bell,[1748] the oil made in this last method is of exceedingly fine quality. The produce he obtained in 1846 was 26½ ounces per 100 lb. of flowers, entirely freed from stalks; in 1847, 25½ ounces; and in 1848, 20 ounces: the quantities of flowers used in the respective years were 417, 633, and 923 lb. Oil distilled from the stalks alone was found to have a peculiar rank odour. In the distillation of lavender, it is said that the oil which comes over in the earlier part of the operation is of superior flavour.

[1746] Perhs, _Proc. American Pharm. Association_, 1876. 819.

[1747] For more particulars see the interesting account of Holmes, _Pharm. Journ._ viii. (1877) 301. The author describes also the disease which is affecting the lavender since about the year 1860.

[1748] _Pharm. Journ._ viii. (1849) 276.

We have no accurate data as to the produce of oil obtained in the ordinary way, but it is universally stated to vary extremely with the season. Warren[1749] gives it as 10 to 12 lb., and in an exceptional case as much as 24 lb. from the acre of ground under cultivation. At Hitchin,[1750] the yield would appear to approximate to the last named quantity. The experiments performed in Bell’s laboratory as detailed above, show that the flowers deprived of stalks afforded on an average exactly 1½ per cent. of essential oil.

Oil of _Lavandula vera_ is distilled in Piedmont, and in the mountainous parts of the South of France, as in the villages about Mont Ventoux near Avignon, and in those some leagues west of Montpellier (St. Guilhen-le-désert, Montarnaud and St. Jean de Fos)—in all cases from the wild plant. This foreign oil is offered in commerce of several qualities, the highest of which commands scarcely one-sixth the price of the oil produced at Mitcham.[1751] The cheaper sorts at least are obtained by distilling the _entire plant_.

=Chemical Composition=—The only constituent of lavender flowers that has attracted the attention of chemists is the essential oil (_Oleum Lavandulæ_). It is a pale yellow, mobile liquid, varying in sp. gr. from 0·87 to 0·94 (Zeller), having a very agreeable odour of the flowers and a strong aromatic taste. The oil distilled at Mitcham (1871) we find to rotate the plane of polarization 4·2° to the left, in a column of 50 mm.

Oil of lavender seems to be a mixture in variable proportions of oxygenated oils and stearoptene, the latter being identical, according to Dumas, with common camphor. In some samples it is said to exist to the extent of one-half, and to be sometimes deposited from the oil in cold weather; we have not however been able to ascertain this fact. The oil according to Lallemand (1859) appears also to contain compound ethers.

=Commerce=—Dried lavender flowers are the object of some trade in the south of Europe. According to the official _Tableau général du Commerce de la France_, Lavender and Orange Flowers (which are not separated) were exported in 1870 to the extent of 110,958 kilo. (244,741 lb.),—chiefly to the Barbary States, Turkey and America. There are no data to show the amount of oil of lavender imported into England.

=Uses=—Lavender flowers are not prescribed in modern English medicine. The volatile oil has the stimulant properties common to bodies of the same class and is much used as a perfume.

[1749] _Pharm. Journ._ vi. (1865) 257.

[1750] _Ibid._ i. (1860) 278. The statement is that an acre of land yields “_about 6 Winchester quarts_” of oil.—One Winchester quart = 282 litres.

[1751] The Mitcham oil fetches 30_s._ to 60_s._ per lb., according to the season.

Other Species of Lavender.

1. _Lavandula Spica_ DC. is a plant having a very close resemblance to _L. vera_, of which Linnæus considered it a variety, though its distinctness is now admitted. It occurs over much of the area of _L. vera_, but does not extend so far north, nor is it found in such elevated situations, or beyond the limit of the olive. It is in fact a more southern plant and more susceptible to cold, so that it cannot be cultivated in the open soil in Britain except in sheltered positions. In Languedoc and Provence, it is the common species from the sea-level up to about 2000 feet, where it is met by the more hardy _L. vera_.[1752]