These plants are for the most part pungent aromatics, a property which they derive from the presence of a peculiar acrid resin, an ethereal oil, and a crystalline matter called Piperine. But they are also astringents and narcotics, and sometimes are so in

Great numbers of species occur in books as aromatics. That which is most extensively employed is Piper nigrum, whose drupes, when dried with the flesh upon them, form both the Black Pepper of the shops, and White Pepper, when that flesh is removed by washing. Although principally employed as a condiment, in order to excite the stomach and promote digestion, Pepper is also extensively employed in medicine in the form of an ointment mixed with lard, against tinea capitis, in relaxed uvnla, and paralysis of the tongue; and infused in spirit and water it is a popular remedy against the return of a paroxysm of intermitting fever. It has been recommended by the Italians for this purpose, and is said to be more certain and speedy, and also milder in its operation than the Cinchona alkalies. See Pereira in Med. Gaz. xx. 180. In excessive doses Pepper is a dangerous stimulant. The fruit of Piper trioicum is said to be still more pungent. The female spikes of Chavica Roxburghii (Piper longum), dried, form the long pepper of the shops. The root and thickest part of the stems cut into small slices and dried, are much consumed for medical purposes in India under the name of Pippula Moola. The

The

effects of Long Pepper are analogous to those of Black Pepper; some consider it less powerful, others are agreed in its being the more acrid of the two. Chavica Chaba, pepuloides, and sylvatica, are employed in India as substitutes for this sort of Pepper. In tropical America similar uses are made of Chavica officinarum (P. Amalago), Artanthe adunca, Peltobryon longifolium, Artanthe trichostachya, and crocata. aromatic roots of many species are officinal in some countries. A decoction of Artanthe eucalyptifolia is used in Brazil as a cure for colic, pains in the limbs, and flatulence. The root of P. Parthenium is administered in Brazil, under the name of Paribaroba, in amenorrhoea, leucorrhoea, and excessive menstrual discharges; that of Serronia Jaborandi, and Enckea unguiculata and glaucescens is held to be sialagogue and diuretic, and is employed for similar purposes. Pothomorpha sidæfolia (or umbellata) and subpeltata are also said to act as powerful stimulants of the lymphatic system, as deobstruents of some energy, and also for cleansing foul ulcers.-Martius.

Another class of remedial agents consists of those Pepperworts which possess the power of allaying inflammation of the urethra and mucous membrane of the intestinal canal. The best known of these species are Cubeba officinalis, canina, Wallichii, and others, whose ripe fruits are sold in the shops under the name of Cubebs. They are aromatic, pungent, stimulant, and purgative, and act as a specific in stopping gonorrhoeal discharges. According to Martius, Artanthe adunca has the same effect in Brazil; and the Peruvian Artanthe elongata has a similar reputation. Of the narcotic Pepperworts the Ava or Macropiper methysticum is most celebrated. It has a thick, woody, rugged, aromatic rhizome, used in tincture against chronic rheumatism. Macerated in water it forms an intoxicating beverage, employed by the Otaheitans to cure venereal affections; they make themselves drunk, after which very copious perspiration comes on; this lasts three days, at the end of which time we are told that the patient is cured. The leaves of Chavica Betle and Siriboa are chewed by the Malays with lime and slices of the nut of Areca oleracea or the Pinang Palm. They produce intoxicating effects, stimulate powerfully the salivary glands and digestive organs, and diminish the perspiration of the skin.

As an astringent, a plant called Matico, and supposed to be Artanthe elongata (Piper angustifolium), is found to be a most powerful styptic and a valuable remedy in certain diseases of the genital organs and rectum. It is much used in South America and Belgium, to stop the hemorrhage from small vessels, leech-bites, or incised wounds. It may be applied in leaf, or in fine powder. It is said also to be taken internally for the same purpose, in the form of infusion, in the proportion of about half an ounce to a pint of boiling water. In Peru the plant is called Moho Moho, and is extensively used for the same purposes as Cubebs, which this Pepper much resembles in smell. An account of it has been given in the Pharmaceutical Journal, 3. 472, from which the annexed figure is borrowed, with the permission of the editor. It is, however to be observed, that the Peruvians apply the name Matico to the Eupatorium glutinosum, a very different plant.

Many other species of this Order are to be found mentioned as plants possessing useful properties; of which here is only space to name Acrocarpidium hispidulum, a West Indian plant used as a bitter and stomachic, Peperomia pellucida as a salad, Coccobryon capense a Cape stomachic, Artanthe adunca and Chavica majuscula, whose bark is rubefacient, and used in Java against rheumatism, and Artanthe crocata, whose spikes of fruit are employed in dyeing yellow.

ORDER CXCVII. CHLORANTHACEA.-CHLORANTHS.

Chlorantheæ, R. Brown in Bot. Mag. 2190. (1821); Lindl. Collect. Bot. 17. (1821); Meyer de Houttuynia atque Saurureis, 51. (1827); Blume Flora Java, (1829).—Chloranthaceæ, Ed. pr. cxxxiii.; Endl. Gen. lxxx.; Meisner Gen. p. 334.

DIAGNOSIS.-Piperal Exogens, with a solitary carpel, a suspended ovule, a naked embryo, and opposite leaves with intermediate stipules.

Herbaceous plants or under-shrubs, with an aromatic taste. Stems jointed, tumid at the articulations. Leaves opposite, simple, with sheathing petioles and minute intervening stipules. Flowers in terminal

spikes. Flowers naked, with a supporting scale. Stamens lateral; if more than 1, connate, definite; anthers 1celled, in Chloranthus, bursting longitudinally, each adnate to a fleshy connective, which coheres laterally in various degrees (2-celled, according to some); filament slightly adhering to the ovary. Ovary 1-celled; stigma simple, sessile; ovule pendulous, orthotropal. Fruit drupaceous, indehiscent. Seed pendulous; embryo minute, placed at the apex of fleshy albumen, with the radicle inferior, and consequently remote from the hilum; cotyledons divaricate. Hedyosmum and Ascarina are both unisexual.

These differ remarkably from Peppers and Saururads, in their naked embryo and pendulous ovule. The want of an amniotic sac (or vitellus) is so unexpected in plants otherwise so nearly akin to those Orders, that nothing but the most careful examination would satisfy the mind of that fact. While, however, Chloranths are in other respects inseparably connected with those Orders, a part of them differ in the very important fact of the flowers being absolutely diclinous. This indicates an affinity to the Urtical Alliance. The anthers of Chloranthus consist of a fleshy mass, upon the face of which the cell lies that bears the pollen; whether these anthers are 1- or 2-celled, is a matter of doubt; one Botanist considering those which have 2 cells to be double anthers, another understanding those with 1 cell to be half anthers. Blume describes a calyx in this genus sometimes present in a rudimentary state, adhering to the ovary, and hence he suspects some affinity between Chloranths and Opercularia. But

I am persuaded that no such rudiment exists: it is not represented in Blume's figures. Natives of the hot parts of India and South America, the West Indies, and Society Islands.

The whole plant of C. officinalis, and brachystachys, has an aromatic fragrant odour, which is gradually dissipated in drying; but its roots retain a fragrant camphorated smell, and an aromatic, somewhat bitter, flavour. They are found to possess very nearly the properties of Aristolochia serpentaria, and in as high a degree. There seems to be no doubt that they are stimulants of the highest order. The mountaineers

Fig. CCCLV.-Chloranthus monostachys. 1. exterior view of a flower; 2. perpendicular section of it, the anther being removed; 3. a ripe fruit; 4. a perpendicular section of it.

of Java employ the roots in infusion, or rubbed up with the bark of Cinnamomum Culilawan, as a remedy for spasms in pregnant women. In like manner, mixed with such carminative substances as Arise and Ocymum, they are administered with great success in the malignant small-pox in children. An infusion of the dried root is successfully employed in fevers attended with great muscular debility and a suppression of the functions of the skin. In a typhus which ravaged certain districts of Java, in consequence of long-continued rains following an unusually protracted dry season, the symptoms attendant upon which were extreme debility, a languid pulse, stupor, violent vomiting and bilious evacuations, the roots of this Chloranthus were of the greatest service. It was again employed most beneficially in a malignant intermittent fever which visited Java in the year 1824. In such cases the infusion was usually combined with a decoction of Cedrela Toona. The root has the great merit of preserving its active properties for a long time if properly prepared, and there can be no doubt that it is one of the most efficacious of all known remedial agents, wherever there is a necessity for continual and active stimulants.-Blume. Endlicher says that the dried branches of Ascarina polystachya, called Earaihau in Tahiti, still retain their hot flavour in the specimens collected during Forster's voyage. Similar qualities seem to exist in the Hedyosmums, which are used in the West Indies as antispasmodics and stomachics: H. Bonplandianum is, according to Martius, used in Brazil in malignant fevers and pains in the limbs.

ORDER CXCVIII. SAURURACEE.-Saururads.

Saururea, Rich. Anal. (1808); Meyer de Houttuynia atque Saurureis, (1827); Martius Hort. Monac. (1829); Endl. Gen. lxxxii.; Meisner Gen. p. 335.

DIAGNOSIS.-Piperal Exogens, with several distinct carpels, an erect ovule, an embryo lying in vitellus, and alternate stipulate leaves.

Herbaceous plants, growing in marshy places. Leaves alternate, with stipules. Flowers growing in spikes, naked, seated upon a scale, . Stamens 3 to 6, clavate, hypogynous, persistent ; filaments

slender; anthers continuous with the filament, cuneate, with a thick connective and 2 lateral lobes bursting longitudinally. Ovaries 3 or 4, more or less distinct, with one ascending orthotropal ovule and a sessile recurved stigma, or connate into a 3- or 4-celled pistil, with a few orthotropal ovules ascending from the edge of the projecting semi-dissepiments. Fruit either consisting of 4 fleshy indehiscent nuts, or a 3- or 4-celled capsule, opening at the apex and containing a few ascending seeds. Seeds with a membranous integument; embryo minute, lying in a fleshy lenticular sac, which is seated on the outside of hard mealy albumen at the apex of the seed.

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3

These plants are very near Pepperworts, with which they agree in Fig. CCCLVI. habit, but from which they differ in the compound nature of their ovary, and their alternate constantly stipulate leaves. It has been supposed that they destroyed the distinction between Exogens and Endogens, but this opinion was formed upon incorrect views, and especially upon the erroneous supposition that the genus Aponogeton, now known to belong to Arrow-grasses, was a part of the Order of Saururads. If M. Decaisne is right in referring his Gymnotheca hither, which is very doubtful, we shall have the singular combination in the same Order of distinct one-seeded carpels, and an inferior ovary with many-seeded parietal placenta.-See LOASADS.

The species are natives of North America, China, and the north of India, growing in marshes or pools of water.

Saururus cernuus has been found to be somewhat acrid; its root, made into a poultice, is employed in North America in pleurisy. The leaves of Houttuynia are regarded as emmenagogues by the Cochin Chinese.

Fig. CCCLVI.-1. Houttuynia cordata; 2. flower of Saururus cernuus; 3. its fruit; 4. its seed divided perpendicularly.