A treatise on therapeutics : comprising materia medica and toxicology, with especial reference to the application of the physiological action of drugs to clinical medicine / by H.C. Wood, jr.

  • Wood, H. C., Jr. (Horatio C.), 1841-1920.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A treatise on therapeutics : comprising materia medica and toxicology, with especial reference to the application of the physiological action of drugs to clinical medicine / by H.C. Wood, jr. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Piper.—Blach Pepper is the unripe berries of the Piper nigrum, a woody vine-like plant growing in the East Indies. White Pepper is the ripe ber- ries, stripped of their skin and dried. It is much inferior to the ordinary variety. The active principles of black pepper are a soft acrid resin and a pungent, fiery, volatile oil. In 1819 Oersted discovered in black pepper Piper in, which crystallizes in colorless, glistening, four-sided, truncated prisms, of a neutral reaction, but capable of combining with acids to form salts. When pure it is tasteless; but very commonly it has a burning taste, due to the presence of some of the volatile oil of pepper. The possession of very active antiperiodic properties* has been claimed for piperin, and it was for a time employed in intermittent fever, but has fallen into complete disuse. The dose as an antiperiodic is four grains repeated once or twice during the interval between the paroxysms. Pepper is very largely used as a condiment; but, as its taste is more hot than aromatic, it is rarely used internally in medicine except as an addition to simple bitters or to antiperiodics, generally in the form of the oflBcinal oleoresin, the dose of which is a minim. In atonic dyspepsia the latter preparation is a most excellent adjuvant to tonic pills. Capsicum.—Under the general term of Capsicum the U. S. Pharmacopoeia recognizes both the ordinary West India Cayenne pepper, the fruit of Capsicum annuum, and the product of Liberia, the fruit of tiie C. fiistigiatum, the African pepper. The berries of the first-named variety are large, bright red, and conical or ovate; those of the second are less than an inch long, and much more fiery than their compeers. Capsicum contains as its active princi- ple an exceedingly acrid oleoresin. The name of Capsicin has been applied by difierent observers to the oil, to the resin, and to their combination, but should, I think, be dropped, as having no definite meaning. Capsicum is a very powerful local irritant, its oleoresin when applied to the skin producing in a very few minutes intense pain and redness, and finally destroying the cuticle. In the alimentary canal it acts in a similar manner: thus, moderate doses produce merely a pleasant feeling of warmth in the stomach, whilst overdoses may cause gastro-intestinal inflammation, with severe pain as well as vomiting and purging. The chief use of Caye7ine Pep- per is as a condiment; yet it is often added with advantage to tonic pills to increase their immediate action on the stomach. When there is habitual feeble digestion, with flatulence, its free use on food sometimes seems to do good. In adynamic disease, especially as occurring among drunkards, capsicum is often very useful by stimulating the stomach up to the point of digesting food. ^ a o Locally, either as the diluted tincture in a gargle, or applied in powder or * For a discussion of the subject, see Die Pflanzenntoffc, p. 492.