scammony (skamoni)

[Early mod. E. also scammonie, scamony; Scammony (Convolvulus Scammonia). R, the root. distance of several feet, and it has a large tapering root which is the source of the drug scammony. They have also a very good scamony and althea here [in Mytilenel, and I saw a great quantity of alkermes, but they do not make any use of it. Pococke , Description of the East, II. ii. 16. 2. A gum-resin consisting of the inspi ated root-juice of this plant. It is obtained by slicing off the top of the root obliquely and collecting as it runs off the sap, which concretes in course of time. It appears in commerce commonly in fragments or cakes of a greenish-gray or blackish color, has a peculiar odor somewhat like that of cheese, and a slightly acrid taste. Virgin scammony, the pure exuded article, is little in the market; the common scammony is adulterated with a decoction of the root and with earthy and other substances, on which account the dried are to some imported and the resin extracted by alcohol. Scammony is an energetic cathartic. French or Montpellier scammony, a substance made in the south of France from the expre ed juice (it has been said) of Cynanchum acutum (C. Monspelia cum ), mixed with different resins and other purgative sub stances.-Lacryma scammony, pure scammony, consisting of the juice mixed with the later scrapings of the cut surface and dried. - Resin of scammony. See resin. -Scammony-root, the dried root of Convolvulus Scam monia, used in preparing resin of scammony. scamp1 (skamp), v. t. [Also in var. form skimp; prob. That all the acce ories most needful to health, but not of the most elegant description, would be scamped or neglected. Saturday Rev. These 9-inch chimneys, he told me, were frequent in scamped houses, houses got up at the lowest po ible rate by speculating builders. Mayhew , London Labour and London Poor, II. 356. scamp2 (skamp), n. [Perhaps scamp , v . (not found except as in freq. scamper ), flee, decamp, scamper , schamper , escape, flee, = Sp. Pg. escampar , escape, cease from (> Sp. escampada , stampede), = It. scam pare , escape, decamp, tr. deliver, save, excampare , campus , a field, esp. a field of battle: see camp2 , and cf. decamp, scamper2, scamble, shamble2. Cf. tramp , a vagabond, tramp , v.] 1. A fugitive or vagabond; a worthle fellow; a swindler; a mean villain; a rascal; a rogue. Scamp . A highwayman. (Thieves' cant.] Royal scamp; a highwayman who robs civilly. Royal foot scamp ; a footpad who behaves in like manner. Grose, Cla . Dict. of Vulg. Tongue (2d ed.), 1788. He has done the scamp too much honour. De Quincey, Works, II. 43. (Latham.) "The impudent bog-trotting scamp ," he thought, "dare Thackeray , Pen dennis, xiii. to threaten me!" The postillions and boatmen along this route were great scamps, frequently asking more than the legal fare, and in one instance threatened to prevent us from going on unle we paid it. B. Taylor , Northern Travel, p. 346. Among the Mexicans... every rich man looks like a Dana , Jr., Before the Mast, p. grandee, and every poor scamp like broken downgen 84. 2. A serranoid fish, Tri so trop is falcatus, of a brown color with irregular darker spots, and with the pectorals edged with blackish and orange. It occurs along the coast of Florida and in the West Indies, and belongs very near the groupers of the genus Epinephelus. See Tri so trop is.