Plantago major Linn.

Plantago major Linn.. It grows from a very short rhizome, which bears below a great number of long, straight, yellowish roots, and above, a large, radial rosette of leaves and a few Iong, slender, densely-flowered spikes. The leaves are ovate, blunt, abruptly contracted at the base into a long, broad, channelled footstalk (petiole). The blade is 4 to 10 inches long and about two-thirds as broad, usually smooth, thickish, five to eleven ribbed, the ribs having a strongly fibrous structure, the margin entire, or coarsely and unevenly toothed. The flower-spikes, erect, on long stalks, are as long as the leaves, 1/4 to 1/3 inch thick and usually blunt. The flowers are somewhat purplish-green, the calyx fourparted, the small corolla bell-shaped and four-lobed, the stamens four, with purple anthers. The fruit is a two-celled capsule, not enclosed in the perianth, and containing four to sixteen seeds.

The pharmacological actions of Plantago major Linn. are Astringent, Deobstruent, Diuretic, Refrigerant.

The indications of Plantago major Linn. are Sores, Intermittent Fever, Bleeding, Malignant Ulcers, Inflammation of skin.

The indications of Plantago major Linn.'s Leaves are Nettles Bite, Bleeding Wounds, Burns, Scalds, Insect Bite.

Odor: The odor of Plantago major Linn. is Odourless.

Taste: Acrid and bitterish.

The active constituent of Plantago major Linn. is Glucoside: Aucubin.