A New Supplement...: Crocus.

A New Supplement to the latest Pharmacopoeias of London, Edinburgh, Dublin, and Paris, Forming A Complete Dispendatory, Conspectus, and Dictionary of Medical Chemistry, Giving All the Old and New Names, Including the New French and American Medicines, and Poisons; with Symptoms, Treatment, and Tests; as Well As Herbs, Drugs, Compounds, Veterinary Drugs, With the Pharmacopoia of the Vetenary College, Nostrums, Patent Medicines, Perfumery, Paints, Varnishes, And similar articles kept in the Shops; With Their Compositions, Imitations, Adulterations, And Medicinal Uses, Being a General Book of Formulæ and Recipes For Daily Reference in the Laboratory and at the Counter.
Fourth edition, corrected, improved, and very much enlarged.
By James Rennie, M. A., Editor of the Quarterly Journal of Foreign Medicine; the Pharmacopeia Universalis; Author of a Conspectus of Prescriptions in Medicine, Surgery, and Midwifery; the Pharmacopeia Imperialis, &c. &c.
London: Baldwin and Cradock. 1837.
London: Thomas Curson Hansard, Paternoster Row.


CROCUS. L. E. D. P. Saffron, Crocus sativus, the pistils of the flowers sold in form of cakes pressed together. Adulterated very frequently with saddron, from which part of the colour has also been extracted, which makes it pale, and of a dirty hue. It is also often mixed with the petals of marigold and safflower; but, by steeping in water, these will unfold and detect the fraud. Shreds of smoked beef are also said to be sometimes mixed with it; which may be detected by the smell it produces when burnt. Genuine saffron ought to be of a bright, deep, rich, orage-yellow colour, not too moist, and adhering to the clothes. The English, French, and Italian are the best. The Spanish is greasy and bad. Medicinally it is aromatic, warm, bitterish, of a sweet diffusive odour, feebly stimulant, cordial, antispasmodic, emmenagogue, and diaphoretic, in doses of gr. v to 3ss of the powder, in atonic amenorrhoea, hysteric affections, and vomiting. Externally it is applied in ophthalmia; but is seldom used in practice now, except as a colouring matter for other drugs. It is much used also in cookery and confectionary.

CROCUS. An old term applied to oxides, and other preparations of the metals.