Note 880 — BOOK XXV. THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE WILD PLANTS. (continued 2)

“Cicuta.” Identified with the Conium maculatum of Linnæus, Common hemlock or Keghs. It grows in the vicinity of Athens, and probably formed the basis of the poisons with which that volatile people “recompensed,” as Fée remarks, the virtues and exploits of their philosophers and generals. Socrates, Phocion, and Philopœmen, are said to have been poisoned with hemlock; but in the case of Socrates, it was probably combined with opium and other narcotics. See B. xiv. cc. 7, 28, and B. xxiii. c. 23.