Cornus Sericea. Swamp Dogwood, Red Osier.

Silky Cornel, Rose Willow, Kinnikinnik.

Related entries: Cornus circinata - Cornus florida

Description: Natural Order and Generic characters the same as in cornus circinata. C. SERICEA: A shrub eight feet high, with opposite and dusky-purple branches, and dark-red shoots; young twigs woolly. Leaves opposite, ovate; two to four inches long by half as wide, nearly smooth above, soft-pubescent beneath, on petioles an inch long. Flowers small, yellowish-white, in depressed and woolly cymes; no involucre. Fruit a bright-blue, spherical berry. Common in wet places. June.

Properties and Uses: The bark is similar to that of cornus florida, but partakes more of the characters of a pure astringent, and less of those of a tonic. It is also more stimulating than the other dogwoods. It expends a considerable influence upon the uterus, and is of service in atonic conditions of that organ. Combined with caulophyllum, it promotes parturition in cases where the system is lax and the pains inefficient; with convallaria and mitchella, is good for prolapsus, degenerate leucorrhea, and chronic menorrhagia; and with an excess of dioscorea, will often benefit the sympathetic vomiting of pregnancy. It has been commended in dropsy and as an antiseptic, but its powers would be limited under such circumstances.

The Physiomedical Dispensatory, 1869, was written by William Cook, M.D.
It was scanned by Paul Bergner at http://medherb.com