Linaria.
Linaria. Linaria vulgaris Hill. Antirrhinum Linaria L. Common Toadflax. Butter and Eggs. Ramsted. Snapdragon. Linaire commune, Fr. Leinkraut, Flachskraut, Löwenmaul, G.—This is a perennial herbaceous plant of the Fam. Scrophulariaceae very common in America, Europe, and Asia. It should be collected when in flower, dried quickly, and kept excluded from the air. When fresh it has a peculiar, heavy, disagreeable odor, which is in a great measure dissipated by drying. The taste is herbaceous, weakly saline, bitter, and slightly acrid. Its constituents are stated to be two glucosides, linarin and pectolinarin (P. J., lxxix, p. 316), with limarosnin, linaracrin, antirrhinic, tannic and citric acid. This plant is said to be diuretic and cathartic, and has been used in dropsy, jaundice, and cutaneous eruptions. It is most conveniently employed in infusion. The fresh plant is sometimes applied, in the shape of poultice or fomentation, to hemorrhoids, and an ointment of the flowers has been employed for the same purpose, and also locally in diseases of the skin. The flowers are used in Germany as a yellow dye.
