WILD LETTUCE
Product No. P2304
Also known as Lactucarium, Strong-scented Lettuce, Green Endive, Lettuce Opium, Laitue vireuse and Acrid Lettuce.
Wild lettuce is cultivated in Austria, France, Germany and Scotland. It is a biennial herb that generally grows on banks and waste places, flowering in July and August. It grows to a maximum height of 6 feet and the erect stem, growing from a brown tap-root, is mostly smooth and pale green, but sometimes spotted with purple. The numerous, large leaves are from 6 to 18 inches long, and obovate-oblong. The stem leaves are scanty, alternate, and small, and the heads are numerous and shortly-stalked. The rough, black fruit is oval, with a broad wing along the edge, and prolonged above into a long, white beak carrying silvery tufts of hair.
The whole plant is rich in a milky juice that flows freely from any wound. This has a bitter taste and a narcotic odour. When dry, it hardens, turns brown, and is known as lactucarium.
The name lactuca is derived from the classical Latin name for the milky juice, ‘virosa’, or 'poisonous' - this juice and the leaves are both used medicinally. All types of lettuce contain some of this narcotic juice, although many varieties now, through cultivation, possess much less. Wild lettuce also contains lactucic acid, lactucopicrin, 50 - 60 per cent lactucerin (lactucone) and lactucin.
In ancient times, people held the lettuce in high esteem for its cooling and refreshing properties. The Emperor Augustus attributed his recovery from a dangerous illness to it; built an altar, and erected a statue in its honour.
To harvest the juice, collectors cut the heads of the plants and scrape it into vessels several times daily until it is exhausted. By slightly warming and tapping, it is turned out of its mould, and can be cut into quarters and dried. It is usually found in irregular, reddish-brown lumps the size of a large pea, frequently mouldy on the outside.
The drug resembles a feeble opium without its tendency to upset the digestive system. It is used to a small extent as a sedative and narcotic.
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