TRIOSTEUM PERFOLIATUM.

Fever root.

PLATE IX.

THIS is rather a solitary plant, and though met with in most parts of the United States, it rarely, I believe, occurs in large quantities. About Boston it is found in several places at the borders of woods in rich, shady situations. Its common names are Fever root and Wild ipecac.* Pursh observes, that it is rare, and generally occurs in limestone soils. With us it flowers in June and ripens its fruit in September.

The genus Triosteum is found in the class

The quaint appellation of Dr. Tinker's weed, which has been bestowed on this plant, is thus gravely commented on by Poiret. "Ses racines et celles de l'espece précédente passent pour émétiques; le docteur Tinkar est le premier qui les a mises en usage, et qui a fait donner à cette plante par plusieurs habitans de l'Amerique septentrionale le nom d' herbe sauvage du docteur Tinkar."

Pentandria and order Monogynia. Its natural affinities place it among the Aggregatæ of Linnæus and the Caprifolia of Jussieu. It is characterized by a monopetalous, five-lobed, unequal corolla; a calyx as long as the corolla; and a berry with three cells and three seeds. The species perfoliatum differs from the rest in having its leaves connate, and its flowers sessile and whorled.

The root of this plant is perennial and subdivided into numerous horizontal branches. The stem is erect, hairy, fistulous, round, from one to four feet high. The leaves are opposite, the pairs crossing each other, connate, ovate, acuminate, entire, rather flat, abruptly contracted at base into a sort of neck, resembling a winged petiole. This portion varies in width, as Michaux has expressed it, "foliis latius, angustiusve con natis." In general it is narrow when the plant is in flower, as represented in the figure; and wider when it is in fruit. The flowers are axillary, sessile, five or six in a whorl, the upper ones generally in a single pair. Each axil is furnished with two or thrée linear bractes. The calyx consists of five segments which are spreading, oblong-linear coloured, unequal, persistent. Corolla tubular, curving, of a dull brownish purple, covered with minute hairs, its base gibbous, its border open and

The

divided into five rounded, unequal lobes. Stamens inserted in the tube of the corolla, hairy, with oblong anthers. Germ inferior, roundish; style longer than the corolla; stigma peltate. fruit is an oval berry of a deep orange yellow,* hairy, somewhat three sided, crowned with the calyx, containing three cells and three hard, bony, furrowed seeds, from which the name of the genus is taken.

This plant was made the subject of an interesting communication to the Linnæan society of New England, by Dr. John Randall. The experiments made by him on its medical uses and pharmaceutical preparations were numerous, and serve to throw much light on its properties. In trying the solvent powers of water and alcohol, he found that water afforded a much greater quantity of extract than alcohol, and that the spirituous extract was perfectly soluble in water, whence he infers that no resin in a pure state exists in the plant. He discovered no volatile oil by distillation, nor any other principle of activity in water distilled from the plant. He concludes also, that

* Pursh observes that the flowers and berries are purple. In all the specimens I have examined, which have not been few in number, the fruit was of a bright orange colour. If Pursh has seen a plant with purple berries, it is probably a different species from the true plant of Linnaeus and Dillenius, which had "fructus lutescentes."