This plant grows plentifully in Jamaica; the calyx is a monophyllous perianth, or rather a simple glume of a lanceolated form, having a very short appendicle on each side. The styles are not four in number; what hitherto have been called styles are only four reflected spines, placed on the top of the germ. The styles, or what ought to be called so, are placed on the hind part of the germ, next to the receptacle, and consist of many subulate filaments, or else are one pensiliform style, divided into many parts. The root of this plant is strong, about the thickness of a thumb, deeply fastened in the earth, and of a brownish white colour; the stem is from two to three feet high, jointed, and becoming woody at the bottom. The leaves spring from the joints and are oblong, three inches long and half as broad, of a deep green and veined, placed alternately on short footstalks. The tops of the branches are for a foot in length without any leaves, but set close on every side with white tetrapetalous flowers, sessile, very small, making no figure; the seed is cuneiform, oblong, with an obscure ridge on one side, and a depressed line on the other, armed at top with four pungent spines, at first almost upright, but afterwards reflected to the back, of a bay or pale green colour. It grows in shady woods and savannas in such plenty as to become a troublesome weed. Its root and all parts abound with very volatile particles, like the horse raddish root, and so remarkably acrid that the smell or taste can hardly be borne. On chewing a little of it, it burns the mouth and leaves the tongue dry, black, and rough, as it appears in a malignant fever. It is much coveted by Guinea hens, whence the name is derived. Its juice has been used in hysteric fits instead of other fœtid drops, with success; and seems well adapted to the purpose when fresh scraped and bruised, and might serve, instead of mustard, for applying to the feet in fevers. As this plant endures much drought, it remains green when others are burned up, when cattle will feed upon it, and it has been observed to give their milk the taste of garlic, and to communicate an intolerable rankness to their flesh, especially to their kidneys; which, however, goes off in about a fortnight, on their being fed on good grass. Sloane says that a piece of the root, put into a hollow tooth, cures its aching.
The passage stops before the long quotation from Barham that follows it (from “Barham calls it coca” to “Barham, p. 43”). That quotation is about coca in Peru, not this plant, and it demeans the people it describes.