MEZEREUM, OR DAPHNE 3IEZEREUM, Spurge-olive, is an indi genous shrub ; the bark obtained, in spring, from the root, is officinal. It is covered by a thin epidermis, green within, brown without. It is destitute of smell, but has a very acrid pungent taste, lasting for hours, and causes vesication. Its virulence even amounts to a poisonous degree, but is said to be lessened by camphor.
In the London Pharmacopceia ' it only enters as an ingredient into the decoction sarsap. comp. It consists of an acrid resin, and an acrid volatile oil, and daphnin, which is not active. [MEZEREON, in NAT. HIST. Div.] The bark yields its properties to water, and still more perfectly to vinegar. The simple decoction of the Edinburgh Pharmacopoeia' certainly possesses considerable power. Mezereon in a small dose acts upon the secretions of the salivary glands, the mucous membranes, the kidneys, and the skin. It also rouses the nervous energy of the brain, as its action in many cases of coma and stupor proves.
It may be employed locally to stimulate the salivary glands, or to remove paralysis of the mouth or throat; when so employed it is to be chewed, but the saliva must not be swallowed, as its acrimony causes inflammation of the stomach and intestines ; and this may even be fatal from the hemorrhage, vomiting, and purging which attend it.
The berries swallowed incautiously produce the same bad effects.
The simple decoction, along with carbonate of ammonia, given in proper doses every two or four hours, has in several instances rescued Patients from a state of imminent danger in the stage of collapse of typhus fever, or that of -coma and effusion at the base of the brain, which sometimes occurs in scarlet fever. In torpor of the brain, in leuco-phlegmatic subjects, and in approaching amaurosis, it is also of use. It has also been found serviceable in chronic rheumatism and chronic cutaneous diseases. A portion of the bark macerated in vinegar and applied to the skin, forms a powerful vesicant. [DAPHNE, in NAT. HIST. DIV.