PART II.

Materia Medica.

277

rolla with the upper lip erect and flat, the under three-parted,

with the segments equal.Species 10. O. vulgare.' Common Marjoram. Med. Bot. 2d. ed. 344.

t. 123. Smith Flor. Brit. 639. Engl. Bot. 1143.Species 15. O. Majorana. Sweet Marjoram. Med. Bot. Id edit.

345. t. 124.

1. Origanum vulgare.Officinal. Origanum. Lond. Common Marjoram leaves.

Syn. Oriang (F.) Dort, Wohlgemuth ((?.) Origano (7.) Origano Sylvestre (S.)

This plant is indigenous and perennial, growing on drychalky and gravelly hills, flowering from July to September.The root is creeping and fibrous, sending up erect, branch-ing, trichotomous, tetragonous stems, about eighteen inchesin height, downy, and of a purplish hue. The leaves areovate, entire, somewhat hairy, ciliated, punctured, and of adeep yellowish green colour. The flowers are in terminal pa-nicles, of a pink-purple or rose colour, and furnished withovate, sessile, brownish-red bractes. The calyx is tubular,toothed; the segments being nearly equal: the corolla is fun-nel-shaped, with the upper lip bifid and obtuse, and the undertrifid, blunt, and spreading. The filaments are furnishedwith double anthers, and the style is filiform, with a bifid re-flected stigma.

Qualities. — The odour is agreeable and aromatic, and thetaste warm and pungent, much resembling thyme. In distil-lation with water it affords a very acrid penetrating volatileoil, on which its qualities depend.

Medical properties and uses. — Common marjoram is re-garded as tonic, stomachic, and emmenagogue. It was for-merly used in debilities of the stomach ; but is now neglected.The dose is from grs. x. to 3J, in powder.

Officinal preparation. Oleum Origani. L.

2. Origanum Majorana.*Officinal. Origani Marjorans; herba. Edin. Majorana ;

Herba. Dub. Sweet Marjoram.

Syn. MdrjoMine (F.) Majoran (G.) Maggioiana (I.) Origano (S.)

This is an annual plant, a native of Portugal and Syria; butcultivated in our gardens for culinary and medicinal purposes,and flowering in July and August. The root is long, brown,and fibrous; the stems numerous, woody, branching, and ris-ing a foot and a half in height. The leaves are clowny, en-tire, ovate, petiolate, and of a pale green colour. The flowersare small, white, appearing successively among the oractes,which are numerous, and form roundish, compact, terminalspikes. The calyx is tubular, five-toothed, with the teeth acute:the corolla funnel-shaped and bilabiate; the upper lip erectand roundish; the lower cut into three pointed segments.

' £«/iifii^» Dioscorldis.

T 3

0{8ya«» Dioscoridis.