COC′CULUS IND′ICUS

Syn. Indian berries , Indian cockles , Levant nut , Louse grains ; Bac′ca Orient a′lis , Cocoulus piscator′ius , ., L. The fruit of the Anamirta paniculata , a shrub which abounds on the sandy shores of Malabar, and several other islands in the Indian Ocean. The kernels should fill at least two thirds of the fruit. It is a dark, tough, hard, wrinkled berry, about the size of a cherry, and po e es an intensely bitter taste. The berry consists of two parts, the husk and the kernel, the former being hard and difficult to bruise, and the latter soft and containing a large proportion of fatty matter. Uses, . Cocculus indicus is poisonous to all animals, and to most vegetables. It is never employed internally in medicine, but an ointment, formed by mixing the powder with lard, has been used to destroy pediculi and in porrigo. Its active principle is picrotoxin, a peculiar needle-shaped, crystalline substance, po e ing all the poisonous properties of the berry in an exalted degree, and of which it contains about 2 per cent. Its effects on the system are, to produce giddine , convulsions, and insensibility, frequently ending in death. A small portion of the cocculus indicus imported is used by poachers, and a still smaller quantity to destroy vermin, the remaining, and by far the greater part, being employed to adulterate beer and even wine. “In our own analytical experience we have seldom found this substance in beer purchased from a respectable house. We have detected it, however, in beers purchased in the lowest localities in London and elsewhere, but have every reason to suspect that the adulterants had been added by the publican himself, in the form of an extract known in the trade by the name of ‘B. E,’ or black extract.” (Harkne .) Chemists and druggists are liable to severe penalties if they are found supplying cocculus indicus, or any extract of the same, to brewers or publicans. See Beer , Porter , .