The dextrogyrate power of cuminol is a little less strong than that of cymene; artificial cymene is optically inert.
Commerce—Cumin is shipped to England from Mogador, Malta and Sicily. In Malta there were in 1863, 140 acres under cultivation with this crop; in 1865, 730 acres, producing 2766 cwt.[1266]
The export of cumin from Morocco[1267] in 1872 was 1657 cwt.; that from Bombay in the year 1872-73 was 6766 cwt.;[1268] and 20,040 cwt. from Calcutta[1269] in the year 1870-71.
Uses—Cumin is sold by druggists as an ingredient of curry powders, but to a much larger extent for use in veterinary medicine.
CAPRIFOLIACEÆ.
FLORES SAMBUCI.
Elder Flowers; F. Fleurs de Sureau; G. Holunderblüthe, Fliederblumen.
Botanical Origin—Sambucus nigra L.—a large deciduous shrub or small tree, indigenous to Southern and Central Europe (not in Russia), Western Asia, the Crimea, the regions of the Caucasus and Southern Siberia. It is believed to be a native of England and Ireland, but not to be truly wild in Scotland. In other northern parts of Europe, as Norway and Sweden, the elder appears only as a plant introduced there during the middle ages by the monks.[1270]
History—The Romans, as we learn from Pliny, made use in medicine of the plant under notice as well as of the Dwarf Elder (S. Ebulus L.) Both kinds were employed in Britain by the ancient English[1271] and Welsh[1272] leeches, and in Italy in the medicine of the school of Salernum.
Description—The elder produces in the early summer, conspicuous, many-flowered cymes, 4 to 5 inches in diameter, of which the long peduncle divides into 5 branches, which subdivide once or several times by threes or fives, ultimately separating by repeated forking into slender, furrowed pedicels about ¼ of an inch long, each bearing a single flower. In the second or third furcations, the middle flower remains short-stalked or sessile, and opens sooner than the rest. In like manner, on the outermost small forks only one of the florets is usually long-stalked. The whole of this inflorescence forms a flattish umbelliform cyme, perfectly glabrous and destitute of bracts.