in botany, a genus of the monogynia order, belonging to the hexandria clas of plants; and, in the natural method, ranking under the 10th order, Coronariae. The characters are: There is no calyx: The corolla is monopetalous, erect, fix-cleft, and oblong; the tube gibbous; the border spreading, and small; with a nectary-bearing bottom: The filaments consist of fix fimbriated filaments, rather surpassing the corolla in length, and inserted into the receptacle; the antherae are oblong and incumbent: The pistillum has an ovate germen; the stylus is simple, the length of the stamina; the stigma is obtuse and trifid: The pericarpium is an oblong capsule, three-furrowed, three-celled, three-valved: The seeds are many and angular. Of this genus, botanical writers enumerate ten species; of which the most remarkable are,

1. The dilicha, by some called the soap aloe, by others Aloe. others caballine aloe. This seldom rises above two feet high. The leaves are very broad at the base, where they closely embrace the stalk, and gradually decrease to a point. The edges are set with sharp spines, and the under leaves spread open horizontally every way. These are of a dark green colour spotted with white, somewhat resembling the colour of soft soap, from whence the plant got the name of soap-aloe. The flowers grow in umbels on the tops of the stalks, are of a beautiful red colour, and appear in August and September.

2. The variegata, or partridge-breast aloe, is a low plant, seldom rising above eight inches high. The leaves of this are triangular, and curiously veined and spotted, somewhat like the feathers of a partridge's breast. The flowers grow in very loose spikes, and are of a fine red colour tipped with green.

3. The vifosa, with funnel-shaped flowers, grows near a foot high, with triangular leaves of a dark green colour. The flowers grow thinly upon very slender stalks, are of an herbaceous colour, and their upper part turns backward.

4. The spiralis, with oval crenated flowers, grows somewhat like the former; only the flowers grow upon taller stalks, which branch out and grow in very long close spikes.

5. The linguiforme, or tongue-aloe, has its leaves about six inches in length, and shaped like a tongue. The flowers grow in slender loose spikes, each hanging downward, of a red colour below, and green at the top.

6. The margaritfera, or pearl aloe, is a very beautiful plant. It is smaller than most of the aloe kind. The leaves are short, very thick, sharp pointed, and turning down, with a large thick end, appear there triangular. The colour of the leaves is a fine green, stripped in an elegant manner with white, and frequently tipped with red at the point. The flower-stalk, which rises in the midst of the leaves, is round, smooth, of a purple colour, and generally about eight inches high. When the plant has been properly cultivated, the flowers are stripped with green and white; and sometimes they are entirely white. This aloe is singular in not having the bitter resinous juice with which the leaves of most others abound; when a leaf of this species is cut, what runs from it is watery, colourless, and perfectly inipid.

7. The perfoliata, or focotoina aloe, hath long, narrow, succulent leaves, which come out without any order, and form large heads. The stalks grow three or four feet high; and have two, three, and sometimes four, of these heads branching out from it. The flowers grow in long spikes, each standing on a pretty long footstalk; they are of a bright red colour tipped with green, and generally appear in the winter season.

8. The retula, or cushion aloe, hath very short, thick, succulent leaves, compressed on the upper side like a cushion. This grows very close to the ground; the flowers grow on slender stalks, and are of an herbaceous colour.

Culture. The proper earth for planting these vegetables in, is, one half fresh light earth from a common, and the rest an equal mixture of white sea-sand and sifted lime-rubbish. This mixture should be always made six or eight months before the plants are to be set in it. The common aloe will live in a dry greenhouse in winter; and may be placed in the open air in summer, in a sheltered situation, but must have very little water. Most of the other aloes are best preserved in an airy glass-case, in which there is a stove, to make a little fire in very bad weather. The tenderest kinds require a greater share of heat to preserve them in winter, and should be kept in a good stove, in a degree of heat ten degrees above temperate. Many other kinds may also be kept in this heat; but the greater the heat, the more water they always require. About the beginning of June, it is usual in England to set the pots of aloes out of the house; but they should be set under the shelter of hedges or trees, to keep them from the violence of the sun; the rains also, which usually fall in this and the following month, are apt to rob them. It is therefore best to keep them under cover the greatest part of the year. The best time to shift these plants is the middle of July. They are, on this occasion, to be taken out of the pots, the loose earth to be picked from about their roots, and the decayed or mouldy parts of them cut off; then a few stones are to be put at the bottom of the pot, and it is to be filled with the composition before described, and the plants carefully put in, the roots being so disposed as not to interfere with one another. They are to be carefully watered after this, at times, for three weeks, and set in a shady place. The common kind will bear the open air from May to October, and should be shifted every year. All the aloes are propagated by offsets, or by planting the leaves. The offsets should be taken from the mother plant, at the time when it is shifted: they are to be planted in very small pots of the proper mixed earth; and if that part of them which joined to the mother-plant be observed to be moist when taken off, it should lie on the ground in a shady place two or three days before it is planted, otherwise it will rot. After planting these, they should remain in a shady place a fortnight; and then be removed to a very moderate hot-bed, plunging the pots therein, which will help their striking new roots. Towards the end of August they must be, by degrees, hardened to the open air, by taking off the glases of the hot-bed; and in September they may be removed into the green-house.

Properties, &c. The aloe is a kind of symbolic plant to the Mahommedans, especially in Egypt, and in some measure dedicated to the offices of religion; for whoever returns from a pilgrimage to Mecca, hangs it over his street-door, as a token of his having performed that holy journey. The superstitious Egyptians believe that this plant hinders evil spirits and apparitions from entering the house; and on this account, whoever walks the streets in Cairo, will find it over the doors both of Christians and Jews. From the same plant the Egyptians distil a water, which is sold in the apothecaries shops at Cairo, and recommended in coughs, hysterics, and asthmas. An unexperienced French surgeon, says Haffelquitt, gave a Coptite, 40 years old, afflicted with the jaundice, four teacups full of the distilled water of this species of aloe, and cured him in four days. This remedy, unknown to our apothecaries, is not difficult to be obtained, as the plant might easily be raised in the warm southern parts of Europe. The Arabians call it f'bbara.

Of the leaves of the Guinea aloe, mentioned by Mr Adanfon in his voyage to Senegal, the negroes make very good ropes, not apt to rot in the water.

Dr Sloane mentions two sorts of aloe; one of which Aloe is used for fishing-lines, bow-stringing, stockings, and hammocks; the other has leaves which, like those of the wild-pine and banana, hold rain-water, and thereby afford a very necessary refreshment to travellers in hot countries, where there is generally a scarcity of wells and water.

In Mexico, the maguey, a species of aloe, yields almost everything necessary to the life of the poor. Besides making excellent hedges for their fields, its trunk served in place of beams for the roofs of their houses, and its leaves instead of tiles. From these leaves they obtained paper, thread, needles, clothing, shoes, and stockings, and cordage; and from its copious juice they made wine, honey, sugar, and vinegar. Of the trunk, and thickest part of the leaves, when well baked, they made a very tolerable dish of food. Lastly, it was a powerful medicine in several disorders, and particularly in those of the urine. It is also at present one of the plants the most valued and most profitable to the Spaniards.

The medical substance known by the name of aloes is the insipidated juice of some of the abovementioned species. The ancients distinguished two sorts of aloes; the one was pure and of a yellowish colour, inclining to red, resembling the colour of a liver, and hence named hepatic; the other was full of impurities, and hence supposed to be only the dregs of the better kind. At present, various sorts are met with in the shops; which are distinguished either from the places, from the species of the plants, or from some difference in the juices themselves. These may be all ranged in three classes:

1. Aloe Perfoliata, focotorine aloes, brought from the island Socotra in the Indian ocean, wrapped in skins; it is obtained from the 15th species abovementioned.—This sort is the purest of the three: it is of a glossy surface, clear, and in some degree pellucid; in the lump, of a yellowish red colour, with a purple cast; when reduced to powder, of a bright golden colour. It is hard and friable in the winter, somewhat pliable in summer, and grows soft between the fingers. Its taste is bitter, accompanied with an aromatic flavour, but insufficient to prevent its being disagreeable: the smell is not very unpleasant, and somewhat resembles that of myrrh.

2. Aloe Hepatica, hepatic, Barbadoes, or common aloes (the juice of a variety of the former), is not so clear and bright as the foregoing sort; it is also of a darker colour, more compact texture, and for the most part drier. Its smell is much stronger and more disagreeable; the taste intensely bitter and nauseous, with little or nothing of the fine aromatic flavour of the focotorine.—The best hepatic aloes come from Barbadoes in large gourd-shells; an inferior sort of it (which is generally soft and clammy) is brought over in casks.

Of the cultivation and preparation of hepatic aloes in the island of Barbadoes, we have the following account in the London Medical Journal. "The lands in the vicinity of the sea, that is, from two to three miles, which are rather subject to drought than otherwise, and are so stony and shallow as not to admit of the planting of sugar canes with any prospect of success, are generally found to answer best for the aloe plant." The stonies, at least the larger ones, are first picked up, and either packed in heaps, upon the most shallow barren spots, or laid round the field as a dry wall. The land is then lightly ploughed, and very carefully cleared of all noxious weeds, lined at one foot distance from row to row, and the young plants set, like cabbages, at about five or six inches from each other. This regular mode of lining and setting the plants is practised only by the most exact planters, in order to facilitate the weeding of them, by hand, very frequently; because, if they are not kept perfectly clean and free from weeds, the produce will be but very small. They will bear being planted in any season of the year, even in the driest, as they will live on the surface of the earth for many weeks without a drop of rain. The most general time, however, of planting them, is from April to June.

"In the March following, the labourers carry a parcel of tubs and jars into the field, and each takes a slip or breadth of it, and begins by laying hold of a bunch of the blades, as much as he can conveniently grasp with one hand, while with the other he cuts it just above the surface of the earth, as quickly as possible (that the juice may not be wasted), and then places the blades in the tub, bunch by bunch, or handful by handful. When the first tub is thus packed quite full, a second is begun (each labourer having two); and by the time the second is filled, all the juice is generally drained out of the blades in the first tub. The blades are then lightly taken out, and thrown over the land by way of manure; and the juice is poured out into a jar. The tub is then filled again with blades, and so alternately till the labourer has produced his jar full, or about four gallons and an half of juice, which is often done in six or seven hours; and he has then the remainder of the day to himself, it being his employer's interest to get each day's operation as quickly done as possible.—It may be observed, that although aloes are often cut in nine, ten, or twelve months after being planted, they are not in perfection till the second and third year; and that they will be productive for a length of time, say 10 or 12 years, or even for a much longer time, if good dung, or manure of any kind, is thrown over the field once in three or four years, or oftener if convenient.

"The aloe juice will keep for several weeks without injury. It is therefore not boiled till a sufficient quantity is procured to make it an object for the boiling-house. In the large way, three boilers, either of iron or of copper, are placed to one fire, though some have but two, and the small planters only one. The boilers are filled with the juice; and, as it ripens or becomes more insipidated, by a constant but regular fire, it is ladled forward from boiler to boiler, and fresh juice added to that farthest from the fire, till the juice in that nearest to the fire (by much the smallest of the three, and commonly called by the name of tatch, as in the manufacture of sugar) becomes of a proper consistency to be skimmed or ladled out into gourds, or other small vessels, used for its final reception. The proper time to skim or ladle it out of the tatch, is when it is arrived at what is termed a refin height, or when it cuts freely, or in thin flakes, from the edges of a small wooden slice, that is dipped from time to time into the tatch for that purpose. A little lime-water is used by some aloe-boilers, during the process, when the ebullition is too great."

"Aloes..." As to the sun-dried aloes (which is most approved for medicinal purposes), very little is made in Barbadoes. The process is, however, very simple, though extremely tedious. The raw juice is either put into bladders, left quite open at top, and suspended in the sun, or in broad shallow trays of wood, pewter, or tin, exposed also to the sun, every dry day, until all the fluid parts are exhaled, and a perfect resin formed, which is then packed up for use, or for exportation.

The Barbadoes aloes is said to be common also in the other West India islands; and the following account of the manner of preparing it in Jamaica is given by Dr Wright in the same volume of the Medical Journal, art. i. "The plant is pulled up by the roots, and carefully cleansed from the earth or other impurities. It is then sliced and cut in pieces into small hand-baskets or nets. These nets or baskets are put into large iron boilers with water, and boiled for ten minutes, when they are taken out, and fresh parcels supplied till the liquor is strong and black. At this period the liquor is thrown through a strainer into a deep vat, narrow at bottom, to cool, and to deposit its scumulent parts. Next day the clear liquor is drawn off by a cock, and again committed to the large iron vessel. At first it is boiled briskly; but towards the end of the evaporation is slow, and requires constantly stirring to prevent burning. When it becomes of the consistence of honey, it is poured into gourds or calabashes for sale. This hardens by age."

3. Aloe-Caballina, fetid, caballine, or horse-aloes, is supposed to be a coarser sort obtained from the same species with the foregoing; according to others, it is the produce of the diticha. It is chiefly distinguishable by its strong rank smell.

All the different kinds are gum-resins, which contain more gum than resinous parts. Water, when of a boiling heat, dissolves all the soluble parts of aloes; but if let stand till it grows cold, it lets drop most of its resin. A strong spirit dissolves and keeps suspended almost the whole of aloes, though it contains such a large portion of guminous parts; hence it is evident, that aloes contains some principle, saline or other, which renders water capable of dissolving resin, and spirit capable of dissolving gum.

Aloes is a stimulating stomachic purge, which, given in small quantity, operates mildly by stool; but in large doses acts roughly, and often occasions an irritation about the anus, and sometimes a discharge of blood. It is a good opening medicine to people of a lax habit, or who live a sedentary life; and to those whose stomach and bowels are loaded with phlegm or mucus, or who are troubled with worms, or are debilitated; because at the same time that it carries off those viscid humours which pall the appetite, and overload the intestines, it serves as a strengthener and bracer. In small doses, repeated from time to time, it not only cleanses the prima via, but likewise tends to promote the menstrual discharge in women; and therefore it is frequently employed in chlorosis, or where the menses are obstructed. It is a good stomachic purge, and is given in all cases where such a one is wanted; but it is looked upon as a heating medicine, and not proper in bilious habits, or where there is much heat or fever; and its continued use is apt to bring on the piles.

It is given in substance from five grains to a scruple, though formerly it used to be prescribed in doses of two or three times that quantity; but these large doses sometimes brought on troublesome symptoms. As it is a slow working purge, it is generally taken at bedtime, and it operates next day.

With regard to this, as well as all other resinous purges, it ought to be observed, that when they are given in substance without any mixture, they are apt to adhere to the coats of the intestines, and to occasion griping and uneasiness; for these reasons aloes is generally mixed with some fomentaceous or solvent body, to destroy its viscid tenacity, before it is given in substance. The substances which are most used for this purpose are, a small quantity of the fixed alkaline salts; soap; the yolk of an egg; and gummosus vegetable extracts. Mr Barton alleges*, that by triturating aloes with a small quantity of alkaline salts, its tenacity was more effectually destroyed than by any other thing he tried; that Caltille soap and the yolk of an egg answered best, next to it; that manna, sugar, and honey, were far inferior to them; and that gummosus, or mucous vegetable extracts, such as the extracts of gentian, or of liquorice root, triturated with the aloes, in the proportion of one part of the extract to two of the aloes, and then made up into pills with a sufficient quantity of syrup, destroyed the viscidity of the aloes, and rendered its operation mild.

Socotrine aloes contains more gummy matter than the hepatic; and hence it is likewise found to purge more, and with greater irritation. The first sort therefore is most proper where a stimulus is required, as for promoting or exciting the menstrual flux; whilst the latter is better calculated to act as a common purge.

For the aloetic preparations, see Pharmacy. Index.

Aloes-Wood. See Xylo-Aloes.

American Aloes. See Agave.