On Poisonous Plants

§. 10.

With easy effort, the Botanist The author uses "Botanicus" to refer to the professional scientist-physician of the Enlightenment. also makes himself familiar with those artificial classes and natural orders of vegetables which contain the milder poisons, and which the Masters of the medical art—those beloved patrons of the human race—are accustomed to include under the pleasant title of medicines. Therefore, all sweet-smelling substances, spices, bitters, astringents, acids, oils, and the rest, are to him those longed-for and fortunate weapons. With these, he is able not only to confront the disturbances arising within the human body, but also to not only soothe, but even radically uproot both minor and more serious diseases. From the class of the "cross-shaped" original: "cruciatarum"; modern Brassicaceae or mustard family, named for their four-petaled flowers resembling a cross. he prescribes the best anti-scurvy agents, cleansers, diuretics, and even blistering agents epispastica: substances applied to the skin to cause inflammatory discharge or blisters, believed to draw out illness. From the "single-brotherhood" original: "monadelphia"; plants where stamens are fused into one tube, such as Mallows. he draws many mucilaginous remedies; from the cone-bearers, balsamic and resinous ones; and from the large family of the "whorled" and "gaping" flowers original: "verticillatarum et ringentium"; referring to the Lamiaceae or Mint family. he selects resolving agents. From the Umbellates Plants with umbrella-like flower clusters, such as carrots or hemlock. he takes remedies for gas and indigestion.

§. 11.

No less known to the Botanist will be those classes and orders of plants which always produce poisonous plants, or remedies that are highly dangerous and not to be used in stubborn diseases without caution and circumspection.

1. Acrid substances, also called corroding and caustic. These act upon the solid parts of the body by irritating, inflaming, ulcerating, and destroying them. Of this potency are many plants equipped with numerous stamens sitting upon the seed-bud, called Polyandrous original: "Polyandræ"; a Linnaean class of plants with many stamens.; as well as all those that are milky and "twisted" original: "contortæ"; an old botanical term for plants with twisted flower buds, often containing toxic alkaloids., which