Ilex aquifolium

Volume II — Special Therapeutics

This is an evergreen tree, from ten to twenty feet high, growing in the southern United States as well as in Europe. The Ilex

opaca belongs to the same genus. Rafinesque considers it merely a variety, and says that the properties of both are the same. “ The decoction and wine have been used for cough, pleurisy, colic, gout, and rheumatism.” Browne (Sylva Americana) says the berries, fifteen to twenty of them, will cause vomiting and purgation. There is another species, the Ilex vomitoria (Cassena), which is regarded by the Indians as a holy plant, being used by them in their religious rites for the purpose of cleansing their bodies of all impurities. It seems to possess the power of causing vomiting persistently and thoroughly, with but little pain or consequent prostration. The Ilex Paraguay ensis, or Paraguay tea, is used by the natives of that country much as Chinese tea is used by us. It is said to “ give sleep to the restless and spirit to the torpid.” It is said to contain Theine.

The only mention of the Ilex which I find in our literature is in vol. Ixxxvii, p. 148, of “A. IT. Z.,” by Dr. Hendricks, who cured several cases of “ rheumatic inflammation of the eye, with periostitis of the frontal bone, which almost always leads to staphylomatous degeneration of the cornea.” He used the first dilution of the Ilex aquifolia, five-drop doses, four times a day, for eight days.