MENISPERMUM cocculus, Cocculus indicus, Cocculus suberosus, Anamirta cocculus." The seeds or berries are the parts used in medi- cine. This substance was employed by the ancients as a poison for fish, stupefying them, and render- ing it easy to catch them. It is stated that the half-ripe, bruised berries, being formed into little pellets and thrown into the water, are eagerly devoured by the fish, which thereupon are soon seized with dizziness, and, after whirling around, remain motionless, and float on the surface of the water. It is stated that if the fish have eaten any considerable quantity of the Cocculus before suc- cumbing to its influence, their flesh becomes poisonous. The active poisonous principle of Cocculus is stated to be picrotoxin. Recent toxicological exper- iments have been made with this substance. It is probable, however, that this does not comprise the entire active principle of the Cocculus, any more than strychnia does that of Nux vomica or quinia of Cinchona. COCCULUS INDICUS. 347 In consequence of its use as a means of stupe- fying fish, and also as the basis of an infusion for the destruction of pedicuH and other vermin, cases of poisoning with it have been recorded from time to time. It has been, and still is, extensively used in Great Britain for the purpose of adulterating malt liquors, it being supposed greatly to increase their intoxicating properties, and also to prevent the secondary fermentation. Cocculus was first introduced into the materia medica, and used as a remedy in the treatment of diseases, by Hahnemann. He pubhshed, in 1805, in the " Fragmenta de Viribus Medicamentorum Positivis," — the germ of the "Materia Medica Pura," — 156 symptoms of Cocculus, together with a few observations from other authors. He had already, in an " Essay on a new Prin- ciple for ascertaining the Curative Powers of Drugs," published in Hufeland's "Journal of Prac- tical Medicine," in 1796, stated, on the authority of Amatus Lusitanus, some symptoms produced by Cocculus in the healthy subject, and had used this language : " Our successors will find in Cocculus a very powerful medicine when the morbid phe- nomena it produces shall be more accurately known." In "Hufeland's Journal," in 1798, Hahnemann published a case of poisoning, occurring in a healthy man, from a single grain of the Cocculus seed. To this we shall recur at a later period, 348 COCCULUS INDICUS. only stating here that Hahnemann relieved the man with Camphor. In volume one of the " Materia Medica Pura," Hahnemann published a proving of Cocculus in 181 1. Some additional symptoms were contributed by Hartlaub and Trinks, in their " Pure Materia Medica," and Hahnemann incorporated these (with three exceptions) into his own proving in the second edition of the first volume of his " Materia Medica Pura," published in 1830. This last publi- cation we shall make the basis of our study. In the introduction, Hahnemann says that " Coc- culus will be found curative where the symptoms correspond, in certain forms of sneaking, insidious, nervous fevers ; in so-called abdominal cramps ; and so-called spasmodic pains of other parts of the body, etc., etc. ; in not a few cases of paralysis of the extremities, and in mental affections." From the publication of this proving to the present day, the records of the Homoeopathic Clinique have furnished, from time to time, cases in abundance corroborating these statements ; and yet, in 1 848 (Canstatt's " Jahresbericht," p. 137), Tschudi an- nounces the discovery that Cocculus "acts chiefly on those parts of the nervous system which control muscular action," and has the impudence to claim as original the suggestion to use picro toxin "in paralysis of the extremities and of the sphincters ; " and Reil, acting on this suggestion, employed a tincture of the seeds of Cocculus, with success, in chorea, in hemiplegia from cold, and in paralysis COCCULUS INDICUS. 349 of the bladder from the same cause. ("Materia Medica der reinen Pflanzenstoffe," p. 220.) Turning now to Hahnemann's proving of Coc- culus, in volume one of the second edition of the " Materia Medica Pura," we proceed to make, in conformity with a schema for the study of the materia medica published in the "American Homoeo- pathic Review," vol. 3, the following SPECIAL ANALYSIS.