An introduction to the study of materia medica : being a short account of the more important crude drugs of vegetable and animal origin designed for students of pharmacy and medicine / by Henry G. Greenish.

  • Greenish, Henry G. (Henry George), 1855-1933.
Date:
1899
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An introduction to the study of materia medica : being a short account of the more important crude drugs of vegetable and animal origin designed for students of pharmacy and medicine / by Henry G. Greenish. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    144/560 (page 116)
    From the base to the apex there run about sixteen hght Hues; these are the fibro-vascular bundles that traverse the pericarp ; they are left, together with the inner part of the pericarp, attached to the seed when the outer part of the fruit is removed. By gently scraping white pepper the adherent part of the pericarp can be removed and the dark brown seed dis- closed ; the latter possesses the characters above described. The student should observe (a) The absence of stalk, (h) The seed completely filling the pericarp and adherent to it, (c) In lohite pepper the adherent inner part of the peri- carp, loith its fibro-vascular bundles. Constituents.—Both the seed and the pericarp contain numerous oil-cells in which a volatile oil, a resin, and a crystalline alkaloid, piperine, are contained. To the volatile oil (about 2 per cent.) the characteristic aroma of pepper is to be ascribed, whilst the piperine produces, in part at least, the pungent taste. Analyses have shown that black pepper con- tains from 5 to 8-25 per cent, of piperine, whilst white pepper contains from 4 to 6-5 per cent. The nature of the resin is not accurately known. The seeds contain, further, a large quantity of starch in minute angular grains united into polygonal masses. Uses.—Applied externally pepper acts as a rubefacient, anodyne, and counter- irritant ; it is given internally as a local stimulant, and as a stimulant to the urethra and rectum ; it is occasionally used for hEemorrhoids and other diseases of the rectum. Fig. 57.—Long Pepper. Varieties SiC.—Long Pepper.—Long (Planchon and Collin.) ^^^^^^ ^^^^ ^^-^^ ^^^^-p^ fj^^^^ p,^,g,. officinarum, CDC, a native of the Malay Archipelago. It con- sists of a large number of minute sessile fruits which, together with the bracts that support them, are crowded together on and partially embedded in an elongated axis so as to form a dense spike. Each spike is about 1^ inch long and \ mch thick • it is nearly cylindrical, tapering to a rounded apex, and