An annual herb, 1-3ft., erect, sparingly branched, softly sessile, ovate, entire, terminal the largest, lateral often unequal at base; petioles ½-l in., becoming shorter above and uppermost (bracts) often sessile; flowers lemon-yellow, ¾ in. diam., on axillary pedicels ½ in. long; sepals ovate, acute; petals twice the length of sepals, obtuse long-clawed, 2 approximate, 2 divaricate; Stamens 12-24, anthers curled, blue-black; pod 2-4 in. without a gynophore, erect, linear, cylindrical tipped by glabrous blunt style, very viscous; seeds black, finely ridged
on back.
A common weed in cultivated ground. Throughout the tropical regions of the world.
Parts used:—The seeds, leaves and roots.
Uses:—The seeds used as anthelmintic and carminative by the Vytians (Ainslie); the juice of the leaves poured into the ear to relieve ear-ache, and the bruised leaves are applied to the skin as a counter-irritant.
In Cochin China, the whole plant, bruised, is used for counter-irritation and blistering. (O'Shaughnessy).
According to Moodeen Sheriff, the seeds are anthelmintic, rubefacient and vesicant. The seeds are valuable in expelling round worms, and also as a rubefacient and vesicant in all the complaints in which mustard is used. The leaves are also useful in the same way as a local stimulant, and the juice possesses a curative influence over some cases of otalgia and otorrhœa. The seeds are used internally in powder with sugar, aud externally in the form of a poultice or paste by bruising with vinegar, lime-juice or hot-water, and their juice for the use of the ear is pressed out by bruising them without water. As a rubefacient and vesicant, the seeds under examination are much superior to the mustard seeds in this country, and quite equal to the mustard imported from Europe'
Used by the aboriginals of Australia to relieve headache. In the United States, the roots are said to be used as a vermifuge. Ph. J. Sep. 1. 1888, p. 179.
The seeds are given occasionally in fevers and diarrhœa (Lindley).
