Natural order, Arachnida. Common name. Cross Spider. Preparation. A tincture is prepared by crushing the live spider and digesting with alcohol. General Analysis Aranea is especially noted for its production of symptoms analagous to those resulting from malarial poisoning, and has been chiefly used in such cases, when the cold stage is the most pronounced, and when the symptoms return precisely at the same hour. Aranea was selected by Dr. Von Grauvogl as typical of what he called a “hydrogenoid” constitution, where there is too much water in the system, the patient being always deficient in warmth, and very susceptible of moisture or dampness, such a condition being especially favorable to malarial poisoning. Characteristic Symptoms Head Headache and confusion in the head; relieved by smoking (reverse Ignatia). Headache continues till evening; becomes milder, however, after a few hours, and ceases entirely in the open air. Headache, with burning in the eyes and heat in the face, also flickering in the eyes on reading and writing, which aggravates the headache. Mouth Sudden violent pains in all the teeth at night, immediately after lying down. Abdomen Sensation of heaviness and fullness in the lower bowels; it seems as if a stone lay there, with unpleasant feeling of faintness in pit of stomach, together with griping in abdomen; sensation of heaviness in thighs, so that they can hardly be carried forward, with confusion of the head; returns the next day at the same hour; lasts half an hour (5 P.M.). Enlargement of the spleen. Stool Thin, fluid stool, with pain in abdomen. Female Organs Periods eight days too early, too strong, and too copious. Chest Haemorrhage from the lungs. Extremities Bone pains of a boring, digging character (Eupat., Mercurius), particularly in the right tibia and os calcis, and in the Has been used chiefly in the treatment of asthma, hay fever and suffocative catarrh. Has been used as a domestic remedy, in infusion, for dysmenorrhoea, leucorrhoea and suppressed lochia.
THERAPEUTICS
Has been used mostly in malarial fevers, and in malarial conditions in general, with the characteristic symptoms (see General Analysis). Intermittents checked by quinine, enlarged spleen, etc. Toothache, worse in damp weather, and immediately after lying down in bed. Lumbo-abdominal neuralgia, worse in damp weather. Diarrhoea, Asthma and bronchitis, always worse at night on lying down. Simple periostitis, or caries of os calcis boring, digging pains.
ALLEN CORSON COWPERTHWAITE was born at Cape May, New Jersey, May 3, 1848, son of Joseph C. and Deborah (Godfrey) Cowperthwaite. He attended medical lectures at the University of Iowa in 1867-1868, and was graduated from the Hahnemann Medical College of Philadelphia in 1869. He practiced his profession first in Illinois, and then in Nebraska. In 1877 he became Dean and Professor of Materia Medica in the recently organized Homeopathic Department of the State University of Iowa, holding the position till 1892. In 1884 he accepted the chair of Materia Medica, Pharmacology, and Clinical Medicine in the Homeopathic Medical College of the University of Michigan. He removed to Chicago in 1892, and became Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics in the Chicago Homeopathic Medical College. From 1901 he also served as president of that College. He is the author of various works, notably "Insanity in its Medico-Legal Relations" (1876), "A Textbook of Materia Medica and Therapeutics" (1880), of "Gynecology" (1888), and of "The Practice of Medicine " (1901).