PHARMACOGRAPHIA.

A HISTORY OF
THE PRINCIPAL DRUGS
OF VEGETABLE ORIGIN, MET WITH IN
GREAT BRITAIN AND BRITISH INDIA.

BY

FRIEDRICH A. FLÜCKIGER, PHIL. DR.
PROFESSOR IN THE UNIVERSITY OF STRASSBURG,

AND

DANIEL HANBURY, F.R.S.,
FELLOW OF THE LINNEAN AND CHEMICAL SOCIETIES
OF LONDON.

SECOND EDITION.

London:
MACMILLAN AND CO.
1879.

[The Right of Translation and Reproduction is reserved.]

PREFACE.

Pharmacographia, the word which gives the title to this book, indicates the nature of the work to which it has been prefixed. The term means simply a writing about drugs; and it has been selected not without due consideration, as in itself distinctive, easily quoted, and intelligible in many languages.

Pharmacographia, in its widest sense, embodies and expresses the joint intention of the authors. It was their desire, not only to write upon the general subject, and to utilize the thoughts of others; but that the book which they decided to produce together should contain observations that no one else had written down. It is in fact a record of personal researches on the principal drugs derived from the vegetable kingdom, together with such results of an important character as have been obtained by the numerous workers on Materia Medica in Europe, India, and America.

Unlike most of their predecessors in Great Britain during this century, the authors have not included in their programme either Pharmacy or Therapeutics; nor have they attempted to give their work that diversity of scope which would render it independent of collateral publications on Botany and Chemistry.

While thus restricting the field of their inquiry, the authors have endeavoured to discuss with fuller detail many points of interest which are embraced in the special studies of the pharmacist; and at the same time have occasionally indicated the direction in which further investigations are desirable. A few remarks on the heads under which each particular article is treated, will explain more precisely their design.

The drugs included in the present work are chiefly those which are commonly kept in store by pharmacists, or are known in the drug and spice market of London. The work likewise contains a small number which belong to the Pharmacopœia of India: the appearance of this volume seemed to present a favourable opportunity for giving some more copious notice of the latter than has hitherto been attempted.

Supplementary to these two groups must be placed a few substances which possess little more than historical interest, and have been introduced rather in obedience to custom, and for the sake of completeness, than on account of their intrinsic value.

Each drug is headed by the Latin name, followed by such few synonyms as may suffice for perfect identification, together in most cases with the English, French, and German designation.

In the next section, the Botanical Origin of the substance is discussed, and the area of its growth, or locality of its production is stated. Except in a few instances, no attempt has been made to furnish botanical descriptions of the plants to which reference is made. Such information may readily be obtained from original and special sources, of which we have quoted some of the most important.

Under the head of History, the authors have endeavoured to trace the introduction of each substance into medicine, and to bring forward other points in connection therewith, which have not hitherto been much noticed in any recent work. This has involved researches which have been carried on for several years, and has necessitated the consultation of many works of general literature. The exact titles of these works have been scrupulously preserved, in order to enable the reader to verify the statements made, and to prosecute further historical inquiries. In this portion of their task, the authors have to acknowledge the assistance kindly given them by Professors Heyd[1] of Stuttgart, Winkelmann of Heidelberg, Monier Williams of Oxford, Dümichen of Strassburg; and on subjects connected with China, by Mr. A. Wylie and Dr. Bretschneider. The co-operation in various directions of many other friends has been acknowledged in the text itself.

In some instances the Formation, Secretion, or Method of Collection of a drug, has been next detailed: in others, the section History has been immediately followed by the Description, succeeded by one in which the more salient features of Microscopic Structure have been set forth. The authors have not thought it desirable to amplify the last named section, as the subject deserves to be treated in a special work, and to be illustrated by engravings. Written descriptions of microscopic structure are tedious and uninteresting, and however carefully drawn up, must often fail to convey the true meaning which would be easily made evident by the pencil. The reader who wishes for illustrations of the minute structure of drugs may consult the works named in the footnote.[2]

The next division includes the important subject of Chemical Composition, in which the authors have striven to point out to the reader familiar with chemistry what are the constituents of greatest interest in each particular drug—what the characters of the less common of those constituents—and by whom and at what date the chief investigations have been made. A knowledge of the name and date provides a clue to the original memoir, which may usually be found, either in extenso or in abstract, in more than one periodical. It has been no part of the authors’ plan to supersede reference to standard works on chemistry, or to describe the chemical character of substances[3] which may be easily ascertained from those sources of information which should be within the reach of every pharmaceutical inquirer.

In the section devoted to Production and Commerce, the authors have given such statistics and other trade information as they could obtain from reliable sources; but they regret that this section is of very unequal value. Duties have been abolished, and a general and continuous simplification of tariffs and trade regulations has ensued. The details, therefore, that used to be observed regarding the commerce in drugs, exists no longer in anything like their former state of completeness: hence the fragmentary nature of much of the information recorded under this head.

The medicinal uses of each particular drug are only slightly mentioned, it being felt that the science of therapeutics lies within the province of the physician, and may be wisely relinquished to his care. At the same time it may be remarked that the authors would have rejoiced had they been able to give more definite information as to the technical or economic uses of some of the substances they have described.

What has been written under the head of Adulteration is chiefly the result of actual observation, or might otherwise have been much extended. The authors would rather rely on the characters laid down in preceding sections than upon empirical methods for the determination of purity. The heading of Substitutes has been adopted for certain drugs, more or less related to those described in special articles, yet not actually used by way of adulteration.

A work professing to bring together the latest researches in any subject will naturally be thought to contain needless innovations. Whilst deprecating the inconvenience of changes of nomenclature, the authors have had no alternative but to adopt the views sanctioned by the leaders of chemical and botanical science, and which the progress of knowledge has required. The common designations of drugs may indeed remain unchanged:—hellebore, aconite, colchicum, anise, and caraway, need no modernizing touch. But when we attempt to combine with these simple names, words to indicate the organ of the plant of which they are constituted, questions arise as to the strict application of such terms as root, rhizome, tuber, corm, about which a diversity of opinion may be entertained.

It has been the authors’ aim to investigate anew the field of Vegetable Materia Medica, in order as far as possible to clear up doubtful points, and to remove some at least of the uncertainties by which the subject is surrounded. In furtherance of this plan they have availed themselves of the resources offered by Ancient and Modern History; nor have they hesitated to lay under contribution either the teaching of men eminent in science, or the labours of those who follow the paths of general literature. How far they have accomplished their desire remains for the public to decide.

CORRIGENDA.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

The premature death—March 24, 1875—of my lamented friend Daniel Hanbury, having deprived me of his invaluable assistance, I have attempted to prepare the new edition of our work with adherence to the same principles by which we were guided from the beginning.

I desire to acknowledge my obligations for great and valuable assistance to my friend Thomas Hanbury, Esq., F.L.S., who has also honoured the memory of his late brother by causing the scientific researches of the latter to be collected and republished in the handsome volume entitled, “Science Papers, chiefly Pharmacological and Botanical, by Daniel Hanbury, edited, with memoir, by Joseph Ince,” London. 1876. To Dr. Charles Rice of New York, editor of “New Remedies,” I am indebted for much kindly extended and valuable information, and to whose intimate acquaintance with oriental literature, both ancient and modern, many of the following pages bear ample testimony. I am likewise indebted for similar assistance to my friends Professors Goldschmidt and Nöldeke, Strassburg. Information of various kinds, as well as valuable specimens of drugs, have also been courteously supplied to me by the following gentlemen, viz.:—Cesar Chantre, Esq., F.L.S., London; Prof. Dymock, Bombay; H. Fritzsche, Esq. (Schimmel &, Leipzig); E. M. Holmes, Esq., F.L.S., &c., London; J. E. Howard, Esq., F.R.S., &c., London; David Howard, Esq., F.C.S., &c.; Wm. Dillworth Howard, F.I.C., London; Capt. F. M. Hunter, F.G.S., &c., Assistant Resident, Aden; A. Oberdörffer, Esq., Hamburg; Prof. Edward Schär, Zürich; Dr. J. E. de Vry, the Hague, &c.

On mature consideration, it was deemed expedient to omit in the new edition a large number of references relating more especially to chemical facts. Yet, in most instances, not only the author but also the year has been stated in which the respective observation or discovery was made, or at least the year in which it was published or recorded. Every such fact of any importance may thus, by means of those short references, be readily traced and consulted, if wished for, either in the original sources, in abstracts therefrom, or in the periodical reports. Opportunities of the latter kind are abundantly afforded by the German Jahresbericht der Pharmacie, &c., published at Göttingen since 1844, successively by Martius, Wiggers, Husemann, and at the present time by Dragendorff. The same may be said, since 1857, of the Report on the Progress of Pharmacy, as contained annually in the Proceedings of the American Pharmaceutical Association, and likewise, since 1870, of the Yearbook of Pharmacy, for which the profession is indebted to the British Pharmaceutical Conference.

PROF. FLÜCKIGER.

Strassburg, Germany, October, 1879.

EXPLANATIONS.

Polarization.—Most essential oils, and the solutions of several substances described in this book are capable of effecting the deviation of a ray of polarized light. The amount of this rotatory power cannot be regarded as constant in essential oils, and is greatly influenced by various causes. As to alkaloids and other organic compounds, the deviation frequently depends upon the nature and quantity of the solvent. The authors have thought it needful to record in numerous cases the results of such optical investigations, as determined by means of the Polaristrobometer invented by Wild, and described in Poggendorff’s Annalen der Physik und Chemie, vol. 122 (1864) p. 626; or more completely in the Bulletin de l’Académie impériale des Sciences de St. Pétersbourg, tome viii. (1869) p. 33.

Measurements and Weights.—The authors regret to have been unable to adopt one standard system of stating measurements. They have mostly employed the English inch: the accompanying woodcut will facilitate its comparison with the French decimal scale. The word millimetre is indicated in the text by the contraction mm.; micromillimetre, signifying the thousandth part of a millimetre, and only used in reference to the microscope, is abbreviated thus, mkm.

Thermometer.—The Centigrade Thermometer has been alone adopted. The following table is given for comparing the degrees of the Centigrade or Celsius Thermometer with those of Fahrenheit’s Scale.

THERMOMETRIC TABLE.

CONTENTS.

PHARMACOGRAPHIA.

I.—PHÆNOGAMOUS OR FLOWERING PLANTS.

Dicotyledons and Gymnosperms.

RANUNCULACEÆ.

RADIX HELLEBORI NIGRI.

Radix Ellebori nigri, Radix Melampodii; Black Hellebore Root; F. Racine d’Ellebore noir; G. Schwarze Nieswurzel.

Botanical Origin—Helleborus niger L., a low perennial herb, native of sub-alpine woods in Southern and Eastern Europe. It is found in Provence, Northern Italy, Salzburg, Bavaria, Austria, Bohemia, and Silesia, as well as, according to Boissier,[4] in Continental Greece.

Under the name of Christmas Rose, it is often grown in English gardens on account of its handsome white flowers, which are put forth in midwinter.

History—The story of the daughters of Prœtus, king of Argos, being cured of madness by the soothsayer and physician Melampus, who administered to them hellebore, has imparted great celebrity to the plant under notice.[5]

But admitting that the medicine of Melampus was really the root of a species of Helleborus, its identity with that of the present plant is extremely improbable. Several other species grow in Greece and Asia Minor, and Schroff[6] has endeavoured to show that of these, H. orientalis Lam. possesses medicinal powers agreeing better with the ancient accounts than those of H. niger L. He has also pointed out that the ancients employed not the entire root but only the bark separated from the woody column; and that in H. niger and H. viridis the peeling of the rhizome is impossible, but that in H. orientalis it may be easily effected.

According to the same authority the hellebores differ extremely in their medicinal activity. The most potent is H. orientalis Lam.; then follow H. viridis L. and H. fœtidus L. (natives of Britain), and H. purpurascens Waldst. et Kit., a Hungarian species, while H. niger is the weakest of all.[7]

Description—Black Hellebore produces a knotty, fleshy, brittle rhizome which creeps and branches slowly, forming in the course of years an intangled, interlacing mass, throwing out an abundance of stout, straight roots. Both rhizome and roots are of a blackish brown, but the younger roots are of lighter tint and are covered with a short woolly tomentum.

In commerce the rhizome is found with the roots more or less broken off and detached. It is in very knotty irregular pieces, 1 to 2 or 3 inches long and about ²/₁₀ to ³/₁₀ of an inch in diameter, internally whitish and of a horny texture. If cut transversely (especially after maceration), it shows a circle of white woody wedges, 8 to 12 in number, surrounded by a thick bark. The roots are unbranched, scarcely ⅒ of an inch in diameter. The younger, when broken across, exhibit a thick bark encircling a simple woody cord; in the older this cord tends to divide into converging wedges which present a stellate appearance, though not so distinctly as in Actæa. The drug when cut or broken has a slight odour like that of senega. Its taste is bitterish and slightly acrid.

Microscopic Structure—The cortical part both of the rhizome and the rootlets exhibits no distinct medullary rays. In the rootlets the woody centre is comparatively small and enclosed by a narrow zone somewhat as in sarsaparilla. A distinct pith occurs in the rhizome but not always in the rootlets, their woody column forming one solid bundle or being divided into several. The tissue contains small starch granules and drops of fatty oil.

Chemical Composition—The earlier investigations of Black Hellebore by Gmelin, and Feneuille and Capron, and of Riegel indicated only the presence of the more usual constituents of plants.

Bastick, on the other hand, in 1852 obtained from the root a peculiar, non-volatile, crystalline, chemically-indifferent substance which he named Helleborin. It is stated to have a bitter taste and to produce in addition a tingling sensation on the tongue; to be slightly soluble in water, more so in ether, and to dissolve freely in alcohol.

Marmé and A. Husemann extracted helleborin (1864) by treating with hot water the green fatty matter which is dissolved out of the root by boiling alcohol. After recrystallization from alcohol, it is obtainable in shining, colourless needles, having the composition C₃₆H₄₂O₆. It is stated to be highly narcotic. Helleborin appears to be more abundant in H. viridis (especially in the older roots) than in H. niger, and yet to be obtainable only to the extent of 0·4 per mille. When it is boiled with dilute sulphuric acid, or still better with solution of zinc chloride, it is converted into sugar and Helleboresin, C₃₀H₃₈O₄.

Marmé and Husemann succeeded in isolating other crystallized principles from the leaves and roots of H. niger and H. viridis, by precipitation with phospho-molybdic acid. They obtained firstly a slightly acid glucoside which they named Helleboreïn. It occurs only in very small proportion, but is rather more abundant in H. niger than in H. viridis. When boiled with a dilute acid, helleboreïn, C₂₆H₄₄O₁₅, is resolved into Helleboretin, C₁₄H₂₀O₃, of a fine violet colour, and sugar, C₁₂H₂₄O₁₂. It is remarkable that helleboretin has no physiological action, though helleboreïn is stated to be poisonous.

An organic acid accompanying helleborin was regarded by Bastick as probably aconitic (equisetic) acid. There is no tannin in hellebore.

Uses—Black Hellebore is reputed to be a drastic purgative. In British medicine its employment is nearly obsolete, but the drug is still imported from Germany and sold for the use of domestic animals.

Adulteration—Black Hellebore root as found in the market is not always to be relied on, and without good engravings it is not easy to point out characters by which its genuineness can be made certain. In fact to ensure its recognition, some pharmacopœias required that it should be supplied with leaves attached.

The roots with which it is chiefly liable to be confounded are the following:—

1. Helleborus viridis L.—Although a careful comparison of authenticated specimens reveals certain small differences between the roots and rhizomes of this species and of H. niger, there are no striking characters by which they can be discriminated. The root of H. viridis is far more bitter and acrid than that of H. niger, and it exhibits more numerous drops of fatty oil. In German trade the two drugs are supplied separately, both being in use; but as H. viridis is apparently the rarer plant and its root is valued at 3 to 5 times the price of that of H. niger, it is not likely to be used for sophisticating the latter.

2. Actœa spicata L.—In this plant the rhizome is much thicker; the rootlets broken transversely display a cross or star, as figured in Flückiger’s “Grundlagen” see p. vii.), fig. 64, p. 76. The drug has but little odour; as it contains tannin its infusion is blackened by a persalt of iron, which is not the case with an infusion of Black Hellebore.

RHIZOMA COPTIDIS.

Radix Coptidis; Coptis Root, Mishmi Bitter, Mishmi Tita.

Botanical Origin—Coptis Teeta Wallich, a small herbaceous plant, still but imperfectly known, indigenous to the Mishmi mountains, eastward of Assam. It was first described in 1836 by Wallich.[8]

History—This drug under the name of Mahmira is used in Sind for inflammation of the eyes, a circumstance which enabled Pereira[9] to identify it with a substance bearing a nearly similar designation, mentioned by the early writers on medicine, and previously regarded as the root of Chelidonium majus L.

Thus we find that Paulus Ægineta in the 7th century was acquainted with a knotty root named Μαηιρά.[10] Rhazes, who according to Choulant died in a.d. 923 or 932, mentions Mamiran, and it is also noticed by Avicenna a little later as a drug useful in diseases of the eye. Μαμιρὰϛ likewise occurs in exactly the same way in the writings of Leo, “Philosophus et Medicus.”[11] Ibn Baytar called the drug Mamiran and Uruk, and described it as a small yellow root like turmeric, coming from China. Other writers of the middle ages allude to it under the name of Memeren.

Hajji Mahomed, in the account of Cathay which he gave to Ramusio (circa a.d. 1550) says that the Mambroni chini, by which we understand the root in question, is found in the mountains of Succuir (Suh-cheu) where rhubarb grows, and that it is a wonderful remedy for diseases of the eye.[12] In an official report published at Lahore in 1862,[13] Mamiran-i-chini is said to be brought from China to Yarkand.

The rhizome of Coptis is used by the Chinese under the names Hwang-lien and Chuen-lien.[14] It is enumerated by Cleyer[15] (1682) as “radix pretiosa amara,” and was described in 1778 by Bergius[16] who received it from Canton.

More recently it was the subject of an interesting notice by Guibourt[17] who thought it to be derived from Ophioxylon serpentinum L., an apocyneous plant widely removed from Coptis. Its root was recommended in India by MacIsaac[18] in 1827 and has been subsequently employed with success by many practitioners.

There is a rude figure of the plant in the Chinese herbal Pun-tsao.

Description—Tita, as the drug is called in the Mishmi country, whence it is sent by way of Sudiya on the Bramaputra to Bengal, is a rhizome about the thickness of a quill occurring in pieces an inch or two in length. It often branches at the crown into two or three heads, and bears the remains of leafstalks and thin wiry rootlets, the stumps of which latter give it a rough and spiny appearance. It is nearly cylindrical, often contorted, and of a yellowish-brown colour. The fracture is short, exhibiting a loose structure, with large bright yellow radiating woody bundles. The rhizome is intensely bitter,[19] but not aromatic even when fresh.

It is found in the Indian bazaars in neat little open-work bags formed of narrow strips of rattan, each containing about half an ounce. We have once seen it in bulk in the London market.[20]

Microscopic Structure—Cut transversely the rhizome exhibits an inner cortical tissue, through which sclerenchymatous groups of cells are scattered. The latter are most obvious on account of their bright yellow colour. In the woody central column a somewhat concentric arrangement is found, corresponding to two or three periods of annual growth. The pith, not the medullary rays, begins to be obliterated at an early period. The structure of the drug is, on the whole, very irregular, on account of the branches and numerous rootlets arising from it.

The medullary rays contain small starch granules, while the bark, as well as the pith, are richer in albuminous or mucilaginous matters.

Chemical Composition—The colouring matter in which the rhizome of Coptis abounds, is quickly dissolved by water. If the yellow solution obtained by macerating it in water is duly concentrated, nitric acid will produce an abundant heavy precipitate of minute yellow crystals, which if redissolved in a little boiling water will separate again in stellate groups. Solution of iodine also precipitates a cold infusion of the root.

These reactions as well as the bitterness of the drug are due to a large proportion of Berberine, as proved by J. D. Perrins.[21] The rhizome yielded not less than 8½ per cent., which is more than has been met with in any other of the numerous plants containing that alkaloid.

As pure berberine is scarcely dissolved by water, it must be combined in Coptis with an acid forming a soluble salt. Further researches are requisite to determine the nature of this acid. In some plants berberine is accompanied by a second basic principle: whether in the present instance such is the case, has not been ascertained.

Uses—The drug has been introduced into the Pharmacopœia of India as a pure, bitter tonic.

Substitutes—Thalictrum foliolosum DC., a tall plant common at Mussooree and throughout the temperate Himalaya at 5000-8000 feet, as well as on the Khasia Hills, affords a yellow root which is exported from Kumaon under the name Momiri. From the description in the Pharmacopœia of India, it would appear to much resemble the Mishmi Tita, and it is not impossible that some of the observations made under the head History ([p. 3]) may apply to Thalictrum as well as to Coptis.

In the United States the rhizome of Coptis trifolia Salisb., a small herb indigenous to the United States and Arctic America, and also found in European and Asiatic Russia, is employed for the same purposes as the Indian drug. It contains berberine and another crystalline principle.[22]

SEMEN STAPHISAGRIÆ.

Stavesacre; F. Staphisaigre; G. Stephanskörner, Läusesamen.

Botanical Origin—Delphinium Staphisagria L., a stout, erect, biennial herb growing 3 to 4 feet high, with palmate, 5-to 9-lobed leaves, which as well as the rest of the plant are softly pubescent.

It is a native of Italy, Greece, the Greek Islands and Asia Minor, growing in waste and shady places; it is now also found throughout the greater part of the Mediterranean regions and in the Canary Islands, but whether in all instances truly indigenous is questionable. It is cultivated to some extent in Puglia, very little now near Montpellier.

History—Stavesacre was well known to the ancients. It is the ἀγροτἔρη σταϕὶς of Nicander,[23] the σταϕὶς ἀγρία of Dioscorides,[24] and Alexander Trallianus,[25] the Staphisagria or Herba pedicularia of Scribonius Largus,[26] the Astaphis agria or Staphis of Pliny.[27] The last named author mentions the use of the powdered seeds for destroying vermin on the head and other parts of the body.

The drug continued in use during the middle ages. Pietro Crescenzio,[28] who lived in the 13th century, mentions the collection of the seeds in Italy; and Simon Januensis,[29] physician to Pope Nicolas IV. (a.d. 1288-1292), describes them—“propter excellentem operationem in caputpurgio.”

Description—The fruit consists of three downy follicles, in each of which about 12 seeds are closely packed in two rows. The seeds (which alone are found in commerce) are about 3 lines in length and rather less in width; they have the form of a very irregular 4-sided pyramid, of which one side, much broader than the others, is distinctly vaulted. They are sharp-angled, a little flattened, and very rough, the testa being both wrinkled and deeply pitted. The latter is blackish-brown, dull and earthy-looking, rather brittle, yet not hard. It encloses a soft, whitish, oily albumen with a minute embryo at its sharper end.

The seeds have a bitter taste and occasion a tingling sensation when chewed. Ten of them weigh about 6 grains.

Microscopic Structure—The epidermis of the seed consists of one layer of large cells, either nearly cubical or longitudinally extended: hence the wrinkles of the surface. The brown walls of these cells are moderately thickened by secondary deposits, which may be made very obvious by macerating thin sections in a solution of chromic acid, 1 p. in 100 p. of water. By this treatment numerous crystals after a short time make their appearance,—without doubt the chromate of one of the alkaloids of staphisagria.

The outer layer of the testa is made up of thin-walled narrow cells, which become larger near the edges of the seed and in the superficial wrinkles. They contain a small number of minute starch granules and are not altered on addition of a salt of iron. The interior layer exhibits a single row of small, densely packed cells. The albumen is composed of the usual tissue loaded with granules of albuminoid matter and drops of fatty oil.

Chemical Composition—Brandes (1819) and Lassaigne and Feneulle (1819) have shown this drug to contain a basic principle. Erdmann in 1864 assigned it the formula C₂₄H₃₅NO₂; he obtained it to the extent of 1 per mille in crystals, soluble in ether, alcohol, chloroform, or benzol. The alkaloid has an extremely burning and acrid taste, and is highly poisonous.

Couerbe[30] in 1833 pointed out the presence in stavesacre of a second alkaloid separable from delphinine by ether in which it is insoluble.

The treatment of the shell of the seed with chromic acid, detailed above, shows that this part of the drug is the principal seat of the alkaloids; and the albumen indeed furnishes no crystals of any chromate. In confirmation of this view we exhausted about 400 grammes of the entire seeds with warm spirit of wine acidulated with a little acetic acid. The liquid was allowed to evaporate and the residue mixed with warm water. The solution thus obtained, separated from the resin, yielded on addition of chromic acid an abundant precipitate of chromate. The same solution likewise furnished copious precipitates when bichloride of platinum,[31] iodohydrargyrate of potassium, or bichromate of potassium were added. By repeating the above treatment on a larger scale we obtained crystals of delphinine of considerable size, and also a second alkaloid not soluble in ether.

In the laboratory of Dragendorff, Marquis in 1877 succeeded in isolating the following alkaloids:—1. Delphinine, C₂₂H₃₅NO₆, yielding crystals one inch in length, belonging to the rhombic System. They are soluble in 11 parts of ether, 15 parts of chloroform, and 20 of absolute alcohol. 2. Staphisagrine, C₂₂H₃₃NO₅, is amorphous, soluble in less than 1 part of ether, also in 200 parts of water at 150°. This alkaloid, although it would appear to be the anhydride of the former, is in every respect widely different from delphinine. 3. Delphinoidine (formula not quite settled), amorphous, soluble in three parts of ether, more abundantly occurring in the seed than the two former alkaloids. In its physiological action delphinoidine agrees with delphinine, not with staphisagrine. 4. Delphisine (formula doubtful) forms crystalline tufts, occurs in but small amount, is sparingly soluble in alcohol, chloroform, or ether.—The total amount of alkaloids afforded by stavesacre is about 1 per cent.

By exhausting the seeds with boiling ether, we get 27 per cent. of a greenish, fatty oil, which continued fluid even at -5° C. It concreted by means of hyponitric acid, and is therefore to be reckoned among the non-drying oils; it contained a large part of the alkaloids.

The drug air-dry contains 8 per cent. of hygroscopic water. Dried at 100° C. and incinerated it left 8·7 per cent. of ash.

Nothing exact is known of the Delphinic acid of Hofschläger (about 1820) said to be crystalline and volatile.

Commerce—The seeds are imported from Trieste and from the south of France, especially from Nismes, near which city as well as in Italy (Puglia) the plant is cultivated.

Uses—Stavesacre seeds are still employed as in old times for the destruction of pediculi in the human subject, for which purpose they are reduced to powder which is dusted among the hair. Dr. Balmanno Squire[32] having ascertained that prurigo senilis is dependent on the presence of pediculus, has recommended an ointment of which the essential ingredients is the fatty oil of stavesacre seeds extracted by ether. It is plain that such a preparation would contain delphinine. Delphinine itself has been used externally in neuralgic affections. Stavesacre seeds are largely consumed for destroying the pediculi that infest cattle.

RADIX ACONITI.

Tuber Aconiti; Aconite Root[33]; F. Racine d’Aconit; G. Eisenhutknollen, Sturmhutknollen.

Botanical Origin—Aconitum Napellus L.—This widely diffused and most variable species grows chiefly in the mountainous districts of the temperate parts of the northern hemisphere.

It is of frequent occurrence throughout the chain of the Alps up to more than 6500 feet, the Pyrenees, the mountains of Germany and Austria, and is also found in Denmark and Sweden. It has become naturalized in a few spots in the west of England and in South Wales. Eastward it grows throughout the whole of Siberia, extending to the mountain ranges of the Pacific coast of North America. It occurs in company with other species on the Himalaya at 10,000 to 16,000 feet above the sea-level.

The plant is cultivated for medicinal use, and also for ornament. The Abbé Armand David[34] saw in northern Sz-chuen (Setchuan) fields planted with Aconite (A. Napellus?).

History—The Ἀκόνιτον of the Greeks and the Aconitum of the Romans are held to refer to the genus under notice, if not precisely to A. Napellus. The ancients were well aware of the poisonous properties of the aconites, though the plants were not more exactly distinguished until the close of the middle ages. The Greek name is supposed to refer to the same source as that of Conium. (See article on Fructus Conii.)

Aconite has been widely employed as an arrow-poison. It was used by the ancient Chinese,[35] and is still in requisition among the less civilized of the hill tribes of India. Something of the same kind was in vogue among the aborigines of ancient Gaul.[36] Aconite was pointed out in the thirteenth century, in “The Physicians of Myddvai,”[37] as one of the plants which every physician is to grow.

Störck of Vienna introduced aconite into regular practice about the year 1762[38]; the root and the herb occur in the German pharmaceutical tariff of the seventeenth century.

Description—The herbaceous annual stem of aconite starts from an elongated conical tuberous root 2 to 4 inches long and sometimes as much as an inch in thickness. This root tapers off in a long tail, while numerous branching rootlets spring from its sides. If dug up in the summer it will be found that a second and younger root (occasionally a third) is attached to it near its summit by a very short branch and is growing out of it on one side. This second root has a bud at the top which is destined to produce the stem of the next season. It attains its maximum development at the latter part of the year, the parent root meanwhile becoming shrivelled and decayed. This form of growth is therefore analogous to that of an orchis.

The dried root is more or less conical or tapering, enlarged and knotty at the summit which is crowned with the base of the stem. It is from 2 to 3 or 4 inches long and at the top from ½ to 1 inch thick. The tuber-like portion of the root is more slender, much shrivelled longitudinally, and beset with the prominent bases of rootlets. The drug is of a dark brown; when dry it breaks with a short fracture exhibiting a white and farinaceous, or brownish, or grey inner substance sometimes hollow in the centre. A transverse section of a sound root shows a pure white central portion (pith) which is many-sided and has at each of its projecting angles a thin fibro-vascular bundle.

In the fresh state the root of aconite has a sharp odour of radish which disappears on drying. Its taste which is at first sweetish soon becomes alarmingly acrid, accompanied with sensations of tingling and numbness.

Microscopic Structure—The tuberous root as seen in a transverse section, consists of a central part enclosed by a delicate cambial zone. The outer part of this central portion exhibits a thin brownish layer made up of a single row of cells (Kernscheide of the Germans). This is more distinctly obvious in the rootlets, which also show numerous, scattered, thick-walled cells of a yellow colour.

The fibro-vascular bundles of aconite root are devoid of true ligneous cells; its tissue is for the largest part built up of uniform parenchymatous cells loaded with starch granules.

Chemical Composition—Aconite contains chemical principles which are of great interest on account of their virulent effects on the animal economy.

The first to be mentioned is Aconitine, a highly active crystallizable alkaloid, furnishing readily crystallizable salts. It is accompanied by another active alkaloid, Pseudaconitine, which is crystallizable, but yields mostly amorphous salts. According to the admirable researches of Wright and Luff,[39] aconitine may be decomposed according to the following equation:—

and pseudaconitine breaks up in accordance with the equation:

The decomposition of aconitine, as well as of pseudaconitine, may be performed by means of mineral acids, alkaline solutions, or also by heating the bases with water in sealed tubes. The two alkaloids, Aconine and Pseudaconine, appear to be present already in the roots of Aconitum; they, moreover, contain two other alkaloids of less physiological potency. One of them, Picraconitine, C₃₁H₄₅NO₁₀, is merely bitter, producing no lip-tingling; it gives well crystallized salts, although it is itself amorphous. Commercial aconitine is a mixture of the above alkaloids. The total yield of basic substances afforded by aconite root is not more than about 0·07 per cent.

The other constituents of aconite root are but imperfectly known. In the preparation of the alkaloids, a dark green mixture of resin and fat is obtained; it is much more abundant in European than in Nepal aconite (Groves). The root contains Mannite, as proved by T. and H. Smith (1850), together with cane-sugar, and another sugar which reduces cupric oxide even in the cold. Tannin is absent, or is limited to the corky coat. The absence of a volatile alkaloid in the root was proved by Groves in 1866.

Uses—Prescribed in the form of tincture as an anodyne liniment; occasionally given internally in rheumatism.

Adulteration and Substitution—Aconite root, though offered in abundance in the market, is by no means always obtained of good quality. Collected in the mountainous parts of Europe by peasants occupied in the pasturing of sheep and cattle, it is often dug up without due regard to the proper season or even to the proper species,—a carelessness not surprising when regard is had to the miserable price which the drug realizes in the market.[40]

One of the species not unfrequent in the Alps, of which the roots are doubtless sometimes collected, is A. Störckeanum Reichenb. In this plant the tuberous roots are developed to the number of three or four, and have an anatomical structure slightly different from that of A. Napellus.[41] A. variegatum L., A. Cammarum Jacq., and A. paniculatum Lam. are blue-flowered species having tuberous roots resembling those of A. Napellus, but according to Schroff somewhat less active.

The yellow-flowered A. Anthora L. and A. Lycoctonum L. produce roots which cannot be confounded with those of A. Napellus L.

The root of A. japonicum Thunb. has been noticed in Europe by Christison as early as 1859[42]; it is now imported occasionally from the East. It forms grey or almost blackish tubers from ⁶/₁₀ of an inch to upwards of 1 inch in length, and from ²/₁₀ to ⁴/₁₀ of an inch in diameter, oblong or ovoid, either tapering or rounded at their extremities. They are of plump, scarcely shrivelled appearance.[43]

Japanese aconite afforded to Wright and Luff a crystallized active alkaloid different from both aconitine and pseudaconitine.

Holmes[44] states that the aromatic roots of Imperatoria Ostruthium L. have been found mixed with aconite.

FOLIA ACONITI.

Herba Aconita; Aconite Leaves; F. Feuilles d’Aconit; G., Eisenhutkraut, Sturmhutkraut.

Botanical Origin—Aconitum Napellus L., [see preceding article].

History—Aconite herb was introduced into medicine in 1762 by Störck of Vienna; and was admitted into the London Pharmacopœia in 1788.

Description—The plant produces a stiff, upright, herbaceous, simple stem, 3 to 4 feet high, clothed as to its upper half with spreading, dark green leaves, which are paler on their under side. The leaves are from 3 to 5 or more inches in length, nearly half consisting of the channelled petiole. The blade, which has a roundish outline, is divided down to the petiole into three principal segments, of which the lateral are subdivided into two or even three, the lowest being smaller and less regular than the others. The segments, which are trifid, are finally cut into 2 to 5 strap-shaped pointed lobes. The leaves are usually glabrous, and are deeply impressed on their upper side by veins which run with but few branchings to the tip of every lobe. The uppermost leaves are more simple than the lower, and gradually pass into the bracts of the beautiful raceme of dull-blue helmet-shaped flowers which crowns the stem.

The leaves have when bruised a herby smell; their taste is at first mawkish but afterwards persistently burning.

Chemical Composition—The leaves contain aconitine in small proportion and also aconitic acid,—the latter in combination with lime.

Aconitic Acid, C₁₆H₆O₆, discovered by Peschier in 1820 in somewhat considerable quantity in the leaves of aconite, occurs also in those of larkspur, and is identical with the Equisetic Acid of Braconnot and the Citridic Acid of Baup.[45] It has been stated to be present likewise in Adonis vernalis L. (Linderos, 1876,—10 per cent. of dried leaves!) and in the sugar cane (Behr, 1877).

Schoonbroodt[46] (1867) on treating the extract with a mixture of alcohol and ether, obtained acicular crystals, which he thought were the so-called Aconella of Smith. He further found that the distillate of the plant was devoid of odour, but was acid, and had a burning taste. By saturation with an alkali he obtained from it a crystalline substance, soluble in water, and having a very acrid taste. Experiments made about the same time by Groves,[47] a careful observer, led to opposite results. He distilled on different occasions both fresh herb and fresh roots, and obtained a neutral distillate, smelling and tasting strongly of the plant, but entirely devoid of acridity. Hence he concluded that A. Napellus contains no volatile acrid principle.

In an extract of aconite that has been long kept, the microscope reveals crystals of aconitate of calcium, as well as of sal-ammoniac.

The leaves contain a small proportion of sugar, and a tannin striking green with iron. When dried they yield on incineration 16·6 per cent. of ash.

Uses—In Britain the leaves and small shoots are only used in the fresh state, the flowering herb being purchased by the druggist in order to prepare an inspissated juice,—Extractum Aconiti. This preparation, which is considered rather uncertain in its action, is occasionally prescribed for the relief of rheumatism, inflammatory and febrile affections, neuralgia, and heart diseases.

RADIX ACONITI INDICA.

Bish, Bis or Bikh, Indian Aconite Root, Nepal Aconite.

Botanical Origin—The poisonous root known in India as Bish, Bis, or Bikh[48] is chiefly derived from Aconitum ferox Wallich, a plant growing 3 to 6 feet high and bearing large, dull-blue flowers, native of the temperate and sub-alpine regions of the Himalaya at an elevation of 10,000 to 14,000 feet in Garhwal, Kumaon, Nepal and Sikkim.[49] In the greater part of these districts, other closely allied and equally poisonous species occur, viz. A. uncinatum L., A. luridum, H. f. et Th., A. palmatum Don, and also abundantly A. Napellus L., which last, as already mentioned, grows throughout Europe as well as in Northern Asia and America. The roots of these plants are collected indiscriminately according to Hooker and Thomson[50] under the name of Bish or Bikh.

History—The Sanskrit name of this potent drug, Visha, signifies simply poison, and Ativisha, a name which it also bears, is equivalent to “summum venenum.” Bish is mentioned by the Persian physician Alhervi[51] in the 10th century as well as by Avicenna[52] and many other Arabian writers on medicine,—one of whom, Isa Ben Ali, calls it the most rapid of deadly poisons, and describes the symptoms it produces with tolerable correctness.[53]

Upon the extinction of the Arabian school of medicine this virulent drug seems to have fallen into oblivion. It is just named by Acosta (1578) as one of the ingredients of a pill which the Brahmin physicians give in fever and dysentery.[54] There is also a very strange reference to it as “Bisch” in the Persian Pharmacopœia of Father Ange, where it is stated[55] that the root, though most poisonous when fresh, is perfectly innocuous when dried, and that it is imported into Persia from India, and mixed with food and condiments as a restorative! Ange was aware that it was the root of an aconite.

The poisonous properties of Bish were particularly noticed by Hamilton (late Buchanan)[56] who passed several months in Nepal in 1802-3: but nothing was known of the plant until it was gathered by Wallich and a description of it as A. ferox communicated by Seringe to the Société de physique de Genève in 1822.[57] Wallich himself afterwards gave a lengthened account of it in his Plantæ Asiaticæ Rariores (1830).[58]

Description—Balfour, who also figures A. ferox,[59] describes the plant from a specimen that flowered in the Botanical Garden of Edinburgh as—“having 2—3 fasciculated, fusiform, attenuated tubers, some of the recent ones being nearly 5 inches long, and 1½ inches in circumference, dark brown externally, white within, sending off sparse, longish branching fibres.”

Aconite root has of late been imported into London from India in considerable quantity, and been offered by the wholesale druggists as Nepal Aconite.[60] It is of very uniform appearance, and seems derived from a single species, which we suppose to be A. ferox. The drug consists of simple tuberous roots of an elongated conical form, 3 to 4 inches long, and ½ to 1¾ inches in greatest diameter. Very often the roots have been broken in being dug up and are wanting in the lower extremity: some are nearly as broad at one end as at the other. They are mostly flattened and not quite cylindrical, often arched, much shrivelled chiefly in a longitudinal direction, and marked rather sparsely with the scars of rootlets. The aerial stem has been closely cut away, and is represented only by a few short scaly rudiments.[61]

The roots are of a blackish brown, the prominent portions being often whitened by friction. In their normal state they are white and farinaceous within, but as they are dried by fire-heat and often even scorched, their interior is generally horny, translucent, and extremely compact and hard. The largest root we have met with weighed 555 grains.

In the Indian Bazaars, Bish is found in another form, the tuberous roots having been steeped in cow’s urine to preserve them from insects.[62] These roots which in our specimen[63] are mostly plump and cylindrical, are flexible and moist when fresh, but become hard and brittle by keeping. They are externally of very dark colour, black and horny within, with an offensive odour resembling that of hyraceum or castor. Immersed in water, though only for a few moments, they afford a deep brown solution. Such a drug is wholly unfit for use in medicine, though not unsuitable, perhaps, for the poisoning of wild beasts, a purpose to which it is often applied in India.[64]

Microscopic Structure—Most of the roots fail to display any characteristic structure by reason of the heat to which they have been subjected. A living root sent to us from the Botanical Garden of Edinburgh exhibited the thin brownish layer which encloses the central part in A. Napellus, replaced by a zone of stone-cells,—a feature discernible in the imported root.

Chemical Composition—According to Wright and Luff ([see previous article]) the roots of Aconitum ferox contain comparatively large quantities of pseudaconitine with a little aconitine and an alkaloid, apparently non-crystalline, which would appear not to agree with the analogous body from A. Napellus.

Uses—The drug has been imported and used as a source of aconitine. It is commonly believed to be much more potent than the aconite root of Europe.

RADIX ACONITI HETEROPHYLLI.

Atís or Atees.

Botanical Origin—Aconitum heterophyllum Wallich, a plant of 1 to 3 feet high with a raceme of large flowers of a dull yellow veined with purple, or altogether blue, and reniform or cordate, obscurely 5-lobed, radical leaves.[65] It grows at elevations of 8000 to 13,000 feet in the temperate regions of the Western Himalaya, as in Simla, Kumaon and Kashmír.

History—We have not met with any ancient account of this drug, which however is stated by O’Shaughnessy[66] to have been long celebrated in Indian medicine as a tonic and aphrodisiac. It has recently attracted some attention on account of its powers as an antiperiodic in fevers, and has been extensively prescribed by European physicians in India.

Description—The tuberous roots of A. heterophyllum are ovoid, oblong, and downward-tapering or obconical; they vary in length from ½ to 1½ inches and in diameter from ³/₁₀ to ⁶/₁₀ of an inch, and weigh from 5 to 45 grains. They are of a light ash colour, wrinkled and marked with scars of rootlets, and have scaly rudiments of leaves at the summit. Internally they are pure white and farinaceous. A transverse section shows a homogeneous tissue with 4 to 7 yellowish vascular bundles. In a longitudinal section these bundles are seen to traverse the root from the scar of the stem to the opposite pointed end, here and there giving off a rootlet. The taste of the root is simply bitter with no acridity.

Microscopic Structure—The tissue is formed of large angular thin-walled cells loaded with starch which is either in the form of isolated or compound granules. The vascular bundles contain numerous spiroid vessels which seen in transverse section appear arranged so as to form about four rays. The outer coat of the root is made up of about six rows of compressed, tabular cells with faintly brownish walls.

Chemical Composition—The root contains Atisine, an amorphous alkaloid of intensely bitter taste discovered by Broughton,[67] who assigns to it the formula C₄₆H₇₄N₂O₅, obtained from concurrent analysis of a platinum salt. The alkaloid is readily soluble in bisulphide of carbon or in benzol, also to some extent in water. It is of decidedly alkaline reaction, devoid of any acridity. Atisine has also been prepared (1877) by Dunin[68] from the root in the laboratory of one of us. We have before us its hydroiodate, forming colourless crystallized scales, which we find to be very sparingly soluble in cold alcohol or water. At boiling temperature the hydroiodate of atisine is readily dissolved; the aqueous solution on cooling yields beautiful crystals. They agree, according to Dunin, with the formula C₄₆H₇₄N₂O₄. HI + OH₂; this chemist has also shown atisine not to be poisonous. The absence in the drug of aconitine is proved by medical experience,[69] and fully confirmed by the absence of any acridity in the root.

Uses—The drug is stated to have proved a valuable remedy in intermittent and other paroxysmal fevers. In ordinary intermittents it may be given in powder in 20-grain doses. As a simple tonic the dose is 5 to 10 grains thrice a day.

Substitutes—The native name Atís applied in India to several other drugs, one of which is an inert tasteless root commonly referred to Asparagus sarmentosus L. In Kunawar the tubers of Aconitum Napellus L. are dug up and eaten as a tonic, the name atís being applied to them as well as to those of A. heterophyllum.[70]

RADIX CIMICIFUGÆ.

Radix Actæa racemosæ; Black Snake-root, Black Cohosh, Bugbane.

Botanical Origin—Cimicifuga racemosa Elliott (Actæa racemosa L.), a perennial herb 3 to 8 feet high, abundant in rich woods in Canada and the United States, extending southward to Florida.[71] It much resembles Actæa spicata L., a plant widely spread over the northern parts of Europe, Asia, and America, occurring also in Britain; but it differs in having an elongated raceme of 3 to 8 inches in length and dry dehiscent capsules. A. spicata has a short raceme and juicy berries, usually red.

History—The plant was first made known by Plukenet in 1696 as Christophoriana Canadensis racemosa. It was recommended in 1743 by Colden[72] and named in 1749 by Linnæus in his Materia Medica as Actæa racemis longissimis. In 1823 it was introduced into medical practice in America by Garden; it began to be used in England about the year 1860.[73]

Description—The drug consists of a very short, knotty, branching rhizome, ½ an inch or more thick, having, in one direction, the remains of several stout aerial stems, and in the other, numerous brittle, wiry roots, ¹/₂₀ to ⅒ of an inch in diameter, emitting rootlets still smaller. The rhizome is of somewhat flattened cylindrical form, distinctly marked at intervals with the scars of fallen leaves. A transverse section exhibits in the centre a horny whitish pith, round which are a number of rather coarse, irregular woody rays, and outside them a hard, thickish bark. The larger roots when broken display a thick cortical layer, the space within which contains converging wedges of open woody tissue 3 to 5 in number forming a star or cross,—a beautiful and characteristic structure easily observed with a lens. The drug is of a dark blackish brown; it has a bitter, rather acrid and astringent taste, and a heavy narcotic smell.

Microscopic Structure—The most striking character is afforded by the rootlets, which on a transverse section display a central woody column, traversed usually by 4 wide medullary rays and often enclosing a pith. The woody column is surrounded by a parenchymatous layer separated from the cortical portion by one row of densely packed small cells constituting a boundary analogous to the nucleus-sheath (Kernscheide) met with in many roots of monocotyledons, as for instance in sarsaparilla. The parenchyme of cimicifuga root contains small starch granules. The structure of the drug is, on the whole, the same as that of the closely allied European Actæa spicata L.

Chemical Composition—Tilghmann[74] in 1834 analysed the drug, obtaining from it gum, sugar, resin, starch and tannic acid, but no peculiar principal.

Conard[75] extracted from it a neutral crystalline substance of intensely acrid taste, soluble in dilute alcohol, chloroform, or ether, but not in benzol, oil of turpentine, or bisulphide of carbon. The composition of this body has not been ascertained. The same chemist showed the drug not to afford a volatile principle, even in its fresh state.

The American practitioners called Eclectics prepare with Black Snake-root in the same manner as they prepare podophyllin, an impure resin which they term Cimicifugin or Macrotin. The drug yields, according to Parrish, 3¾ per cent. of this substance, which is sold in the form of scales or as a dark brown powder.

Uses—Cimicifuga usually prescribed in the form of tincture (called Tinctura Actæa racemosæ) has been employed chiefly in rheumatic affections. It is also used in dropsy, the early stages of phthisis, and in chronic bronchial disease. A strong tincture has been lately recommended in America as an external application for reducing inflammation.[76]

MAGNOLIACEÆ.

CORTEX WINTERANUS.

Cortex Winteri, Cortex Magellanicus; Winter’s Bark, Winter’s Cinnamon; F. Ecorce de Winter; G. Wintersrinde, Magellanischer Zimmt.

Botanical Origin—Drimys[77] Winteri Forster, a tree distributed throughout the American continent from Mexico to Cape Horn. It presents considerable variation in form and size of leaf and flower in the different countries in which it occurs, on which account it has received from botanists several distinct specific names. Hooker[78] has reduced these species to a single type, a course in which he has been followed by Eichler in his monograph of the small order Winteraceæ[79].—In April, 1877, the tree was blossoming in the open air in the botanic garden at Dublin.

History—In 1577 Captain Drake, afterwards better known as Sir Francis Drake, having obtained from Queen Elizabeth a commission to conduct a squadron to the South Seas, set sail from Plymouth with five ships; and having abandoned two of his smaller vessels, passed into the Pacific Ocean by the Straits of Magellan in the autumn of the following year. But on the 7th September, 1578, there arose a dreadful storm, which dispersed the little fleet. Drake’s ship, the Pelican, was driven southward, the Elizabeth, under the command of Captain Winter, repassed the Straits and returned to England, while the third vessel, the Marigold, was heard of no more.

Winter remained three weeks in the Straits of Magellan to recover the health of his crew, during which period, according to Clusius (the fact is not mentioned in Hakluyt’s account of the voyage), he collected a certain aromatic bark, of which, having removed the acridity by steeping it in honey, he made use as a spice and medicine for scurvy during his voyage to England, where he arrived in 1579.

A specimen of this bark having been presented to Clusius, he gave it the name of Cortex Winteranus, and figured and described it in his pamphlet: “Aliquot notæ in Garciæ aromatum historiam,” Antverpiæ, 1582, p. 30, and also in the Libri Exoticorum, published in 1605. He afterwards received a specimen with wood attached, which had been collected by the Dutch navigator Sebald de Weerdt.

Van Noort, another well-known Dutch navigator, who visited the Straits of Magellan in 1600, mentions cutting wood at Port Famine to make a boat, and that the bark of the trees was hot and biting like pepper. It is stated by Murray that he also brought the bark to Europe.

But although the straits of Magellan were several times visited about this period, it is certain that no regular communication between that remote region and Europe existed either then or subsequently; and we may reasonably conclude that Winter’s Bark became a drug of great rarity, and known to but few persons. It thus happened that, notwithstanding most obvious differences, the Canella alba of the West Indies, and another bark of which we shall speak further on, having been found to possess the pungency of Winter’s Bark, were (owing to the scarcity of the latter) substituted for it, until at length the peculiar characters of the original drug came to be entirely forgotten.

The tree was figured by Sloane in 1693, from a specimen (still extant in the British Museum) brought from Magellan’s Straits by Handisyd, a ship’s surgeon, who had experienced its utility in treating scurvy.

Feuillée,[80] a French botanist, found the Winter’s Bark-tree in Chili (1709-11), and figured it as Boigue cinnamomifera. It was, however, Forster,[81] the botanist of Cook’s second expedition round the world, who first described the tree accurately, and named it Drimys Winteri. He met with it in 1773 in Magellan’s Straits, and on the eastern coasts of Tierra del Fuego, where it grows abundantly, forming an evergreen tree of 40 feet, while on the western shores it is but a shrub of 10 feet high. Specimens have been collected in these and adjacent localities by many subsequent botanists, among others by Dr. J. D. Hooker, who states that about Cape Horn the tree occurs from the sea-level to an elevation of 1000 feet.

Although the bark of Drimys was never imported as an article of trade from Magellan’s Straits, it has in recent times been occasionally brought into the market from other parts of South America, where it is in very general use. Yet so little are drug dealers acquainted with it, that its true name and origin have seldom been recognized.[82]

Description—We have examined specimens of true Winter’s Bark from the Straits of Magellan, Chili, Peru, New Granada, and Mexico, and find in each the same general characters. The bark is in quills or channelled pieces, often crooked, twisted or bent backwards, generally only a few inches in length. It is most extremely thick (⅒ to ³/₁₀ of an inch) and appears to have shrunk very much in drying, bark a quarter of an inch thick having sometimes rolled itself into a tube only three times as much in external diameter. Young pieces have an ashy-grey suberous coat beset with lichens. In older bark, the outer coat is sometimes whitish and silvery, but more often of a dark rusty brown, which is the colour of the internal substance, as well as of the surface next the wood. The inner side of the bark is strongly characterized by very rough striæ, or, as seen under a lens, by small short and sharp longitudinal ridges, with occasional fissures indicative of great contraction of the inner layer in drying. In a piece broken or cut transversely, it is easy to perceive that the ridges in question are the ends of rays of white liber which diverge towards the circumference in radiate order, a dark rusty parenchyme intervening between them. No such feature is ever observable in either Canella or Cinnamodendron.

Winter’s Bark has a short, almost earthy fracture, an intolerably pungent burning taste, and an odour which can only be described as terebinthinous. When fresh its smell may be more agreeable. The descriptions of Clusius, as alluded to above, are perfectly agreeing and even his figures as nearly as might be expected.

Microscopic Structure—In full-grown specimens the most striking fact is the predominance of sclerenchymatous cells. The tissue moreover contains numerous large oil-ducts, chiefly in the inner portion of the large medullary rays. A fibrous structure of the inner part of the bark is observable only in the youngest specimens.[83] Very small starch granules are met with in the drug, yet less numerous than in canella. The tissue of the former assumes a blackish blue colour on addition of perchloride of iron.

The wood of Drimys consists of dotted prosenchyme, traversed by medullary rays, the cells of which are punctuated and considerably larger than in Coniferæ.

Chemical Composition—No satisfactory chemical examination has been made of true Winter’s Bark. Its chief constituents, as already pointed out, are tannic matters and essential oil, probably also a resin. In a cold aqueous infusion, a considerable amount of mucilage is indicated by neutral acetate of lead. On addition of potash it yields a dark somewhat violet liquid. Canella alba is but little altered by the same treatment. By reason of its astringency the bark is used in Chili for tanning.[84]

Uses—Winter’s Bark is a stimulating tonic and antiscorbutic, now almost obsolete in Europe. It is much used in Brazil and other parts of South America as a remedy in diarrhœa and gastric debility.

Substitute—False Winter’s Bark—We have shown that the bark of Drimys or True Winter’s Bark has been confounded with the pungent bark of Canella alba L., and with an allied bark, also the produce of Jamaica. The latter is that of Cinnamodendron corticosum Miers,[85] a tree growing in the higher mountain woods of St. Thomas-in-the-Vale and St. John, but not observed in any other of the West Indian islands than Jamaica. It was probably vaguely known to Sloane when he described the “Wild Cinamon tree, commonly, but falsely, called Cortex Winteranus,” which, he says, has leaves resembling those of Lauro-cerasus; though the tree he figures is certainly Canella alba.[86] Long[87] in 1774, speaks of Wild Cinamon, Canella alba, or Bastard Cortex Winteranus, saying that it is used by most apothecaries instead of the true Cortex Winteranus.

It is probable that both writers really had in view Cinnamodendron, the bark of which has been known and used as Winter’s Bark, both in England and on the continent from an early period up to the present time.[88] It is the bark figured as Cortex Winteranus by Goebel and Kunze[89] and described by Mérat and De Lens,[90] Pereira, and other writers of repute. Guibourt indeed pointed out in 1850 its great dissimilarity to the bark of Drimys and questioned if it could be derived from that genus.

It is a strange fact that the tree should have been confounded with Canella alba L., differing from it as it does in the most obvious manner, not only in form of leaf, but in having the flowers axillary, whereas those of C. alba are terminal. Although Cinnamodendron corticosum is a tree sometimes as much as 90 feet high[91] and must have been well known in Jamaica for more than a century, yet it had no botanical name until 1858 when it was described by Miers[92] and referred to the small genus Cinnamodendron which is closely allied to Canella.

The bark of Cinnamodendron has the general structure of Canella alba. There is the same thin corky outer coat (which is not removed) dotted with round scars, the same form of quills and fracture. But the tint is different, being more or less of a ferruginous brown. The inner surface which is a little more fibrous than in canella, varies in colour, being yellowish, brown, or of a deep chocolate. The bark is violently pungent but not bitter, and has a very agreeable cinnamon-like odour.

In microscopic structure it approaches very close to canella; yet the thick-walled cells of the latter exist to a much larger extent and are here seen to belong to the suberous tissue. The medullary rays are loaded with oxalate of calcium.

Cinnamodendron bark has not been analysed. Its decoction is blackened by a persalt of iron whereby it may be distinguished from Canella alba; and is coloured intense purplish brown by iodine, which is not the case with a decoction of true Winter’s Bark.

FRUCTUS ANISI STELLATI.

Semen Badiana[93]; Star-Anise; F. Badiane, Anis étoilé; G. Sternanis.

Botanical Origin—Illicium anisatum Loureiro (I. religiosum Sieb.). A small tree, 20 to 25 feet high, native of the south-western provinces of China; introduced at an early period into Japan by the Buddhists and planted about their temples.

Kämpfer in his travels in Japan, in 1690-1692, discovered and figured a tree called Somo or Skimmi[94] which subsequent authors assumed to be the source of the drug Star-anise. The tree was also found in Japan by Thunberg[95] who remarked that its capsules are not so aromatic as those found in trade. Von Siebold in 1825 noticed the same fact, in consequence of which he regarded the tree as distinct from that of Loureiro, naming it Illicium Japonicum, a name he changed in 1837 to I. religiosum. Baillon,[96] while admitting certain differences between the fruits of the Chinese and Japanese trees, holds them to constitute but one species, and the same view is taken by Miquel.[97]

The star-anise of commerce is produced in altitudes of 2500 metres in the north-western parts of the province of Yunnan in South-western China where the tree, which attains a height of 12 to 15 feet, grows in abundance.[98] The fruits of the Japanese variety of the tree are not collected, and the Chinese drug alone is in use even in Japan.

History—Notwithstanding its striking appearance, there is no evidence that star-anise found its way to Europe like other Eastern spices during the middle ages. Concerning its ancient use in China, the only fact we have found recorded is, that during the Sung dynasty, a.d. 970-1127, star-anise was levied as tribute in the southern part of Kien-chow, now Yen-ping-fu, in Fokien.[99]

Star-anise was brought to England from the Philippines by the voyager Candish, about a.d. 1588. Clusius obtained it in London from the apothecary Morgan and the druggist Garet, and described it in 1601.[100] The drug appears to have been rare in the time of Pomet, who states (1694) that the Dutch use it to flavour their beverages of tea and “sorbec.”[101] In those times it was brought to Europe by way of Russia, and was thence called Cardamomum Siberiense, or Annis de Sibérie.

Description—The fruit of Illicium anisatum is formed of 8 one-seeded carpels, originally upright, but afterwards spread into a radiate whorl and united in a single row round a short central column which proceeds from an oblique pedicel. When ripe they are woody and split longitudinally at the upturned ventral suture, so that the shining seed becomes visible. This seed, which is elliptical and somewhat flattened, stands erect in the carpel; it is truncated on the side adjoining the central column, and is there attached by an obliquely-rising funicle. The upper edge of the seed is keeled, the lower rounded. The boat-shaped carpels, to the number of 8, are attached to the column through their whole height, but adhere to each other only slightly at the base; the upper or split side of each carpel occupies a nearly horizontal position. The carpels are irregularly wrinkled, especially below, and are more or less beaked at the apex; their colour is a rusty brown. Internally they are of a brighter colour, smooth, and with a cavity in the lower half corresponding to the shape of the seed. The cavity is formed of a separate wall, ½ millim. thick, which, as well as the testa of the seed, distinctly exhibits a radiate structure. The small embryo lies next the hilum in the soft albumen, which is covered by a dark brown endopleura. The seed, which is not much aromatic, amounts to about one-fifth of the entire weight of the fruit.

Star-anise has an agreeable aromatic taste and smell, more resembling fennel than anise, on which account it was at first designated Fœniculum Sinense.[102] When pulverised, it has a subacid after-taste.

Microscopic Structure—The carpels consist of an external, loose, dark brown layer and a thick inner wall, separated by fibro-vascular bundles. The outer layer exhibits numerous large cells, containing pale yellow volatile oil. The inner wall of the carpels consists of woody prosenchyme in those parts which are exterior to the seed cavity, and especially in the shining walls laid bare by the splitting of the ventral suture. The inner surface of the carpel is entirely composed of sclerenchyme. A totally different structure is exhibited by this stony shell where it lines the cavity occupied by the seed. Here it is composed of a single row of cells, consisting of straight tubes exactly parallel to one another, more than 500 mkm. long, and 70 mkm. in diameter, placed vertically to the seed cavity; their porous walls, marked with fine spiral striations, display splendid colours in polarized light. The seed contains albumen and drops of fat. Starch is wanting in star-anise, except a little in the fruit-stalk.

Chemical Composition—The volatile oil amounts to four or five per cent. Its composition is that of the oils of fennel or anise. We observed that oil of star-anise, as distilled by one of us, continued fluid below 8° C. It solidified at that temperature as soon as a crystal of anethol (see our article on Fructus Anisi) was brought in contact with the oil. The crystallized mass began to melt again at 16° C. The oils of anise and star-anise possess no striking optical differences, both deviating very little to the left. We are unable to give any chemical characters by which they can be discriminated, although they are distinguished by dealers; the oil of star-anise imparts a somewhat different flavour, for instance, to drinks than that produced by anise oil.

Star-anise is rich in sugar, which seems to be cane-sugar inasmuch as it does not reduce alkaline cupric tartrate. An aqueous extract of the fruit assumes, on addition of alcohol, the form of a clear mucilaginous jelly, of which pectin is probably a constituent. The seeds contain a large quantity of fixed oil.

Commerce—Star-anise is shipped to Europe and India from China. In 1872 Shanghai imported, mostly by way of Hong Kong 5273 peculs (703,066 lb.), a large proportion of which was re-shipped to other ports of China.[103] According to Rondot (l. c.) the best is first brought by junks from Fokien to Canton, being exported from Tsiouen-tchou-fou. A little is also collected in Kiangsi and Kuang-tung. The same drug, under the name of Bādiyāne-khatāi (i.e. Chinese fennel), is carried by inland trade from China to Yarkand and thence to India, where it is much esteemed.

Uses—Star-anise is employed to flavour spirits, the principal consumption being in Germany, France, and Italy. It is not used in medicine at least in England, except in the form of essential oil, which is often sold for oil of aniseed.

MENISPERMACEÆ.

RADIX CALUMBÆ.

Radix Columba; Calumba or Colombo Root; F. Racine de Colombo; G. Kalumbawurzel, Columbowurzel.

Botanical Origin—Jateorhiza palmata Miers[104] a diœcious perennial plant, with large fleshy roots and herbaceous annual stems, climbing over bushes and to the tops of lofty trees. The leaves are of large size and on long stalks, palmate-lobed and membranous. The male flowers are in racemose panicles a foot or more in length, setose-hispid at least in their lower part, or nearly glabrous. The whole part is more or less hispid with spreading setæ and glandular hairs.

It is indigenous to the forests of Eastern Africa between Ibo or Oibo, the most northerly of the Portuguese settlements (lat. 12° 28′ S.), and the banks of the Zambesi, a strip of coast which includes the towns of Mozambique and Quilimane. Kirk found it (1860) in abundance at Shupanga, among the hills near Morambala, at Kebrabasa and near Senna, localities all in the region of the Zambesi. Peters[105] states that on the islands of Ibo and Mozambique the plant is cultivated. In the Kew Herbarium is a specimen from the interior of Madagascar.

The plant was introduced into Mauritius a century ago in the time of the French governor Le Poivre, but seems to have been lost, for after many attempts it was again introduced in 1825 by living specimens procured from Ibo by Captain Owen.[106] It still thrives there in the Botanical Garden of Pamplemousses.

It was taken from Mozambique to India in 1805 and afterwards cultivated by Roxburgh in the Calcutta Garden, where however it has long ceased to exist.

History—The root is held in high esteem among the natives of Eastern Africa who call it Kalumb, and use it for the cure of dysentery and as a general remedy for almost any disorder.

It was brought to Europe by the Portuguese in the 17th century, and is first noticed briefly in 1671 by Francesco Redi, who speaks of it[107] as an antidote to poison deserving trial.

No further attention was paid to the drug for nearly a century, when Percival[108] in 1773 re-introduced it as “a medicine of considerable efficacy ... not so generally known in practice as it deserves to be.” From this period it began to come into general use. J. Gurney Bevan, a London druggist, writing to a correspondent in 1777 alludes to it as—“an article not yet much dealt in and subject to great fluctuation.” It was in fact at this period extremely dear, and in Mr. Bevan’s stock-books is valued in 1776 and 1777 at 30s. per lb., in 1780 at 28s., 1781 at 64s., 1782 at 15s., 1783 at 6s. Calumba was admitted to the London Pharmacopœia in 1788.

Collection—As to the collection and preparation of the drug for the market, the only account we possess is that obtained by Dr. Berry,[109] which states that the roots are dug up in the month of March, which is the dry season, cut into slices and dried in the shade.

Description—The calumba plant produces great fusiform fleshy roots growing several together from a short head. Some fresh specimens sent to one of us (H.) from the Botanic Garden, Mauritius, in 1866, and others from that of Trinidad in 1868, were portions of cylindrical roots, 3 to 4 inches in diameter, externally rough and brown and internally firm, fleshy, and of a brilliant yellow. When sliced transversely, and dried by a gentle heat, these roots exactly resemble imported calumba except for being much fresher and brighter.

The calumba of commerce consists of irregular flattish pieces of a circular or oval outline, 1 to 2 inches or more in diameter, and ⅛ to ½ an inch thick. In drying, the central portion contracts more than the exterior: hence the pieces are thinnest in the middle. The outer edge is invested with a brown wrinkled layer which covers a corky bark about ⅜ of an inch thick, surrounding a pithless internal substance, from which it is separated by a fine dark shaded line. The pieces are light and of a corky texture, easily breaking with a mealy fracture. Their colour is a dull greenish yellow, brighter when the outer surface is shaved off with a knife.[110] The drug has a weak musty odour and a rather nauseous bitter taste. It often arrives much perforated by insects, but seems not liable to such depredations here.

Microscopic Structure—On a transverse section the root exhibits a circle of radiate vascular bundles only in the layer immediately connected with the cambial zone; they project much less distinctly into the cortical part. The tissue of the whole root, except the cork and vascular bundles, is made up of large parenchymatous cells. In the outer part of the bark, some of them have their yellow walls thickened and are loaded with fine crystals of oxalate of calcium, whilst all the other cells contain very large starch granules, attaining as much as 90 mkm. The short fracture of the root is due to the absence of a proper ligneous or liber tissue.

Chemical Composition—The bitter taste of calumba, and probably likewise its medicinal properties, are due to three distinct substances, Columbin, Berberine, and Columbic Acid.

Columbin, or Columba-Bitter was discovered by Wittstock in 1830. It is a neutral bitter principle, crystallizing in colourless rhombic prisms, slightly soluble in cold alcohol or ether, but dissolving more freely in those liquids when boiling. It is soluble in aqueous alkalis and in acetic acid.

The presence of Berberine in calumba was ascertained in 1848 by Bödeker, who showed that the yellow cell-walls of the root owe their colour to it and (as we may add) to Columbic Acid, another substance discovered by the same chemist in the following year. Columbic Acid is yellow, amorphous, nearly insoluble in cold water, but dissolving in alcohol and in alkaline solutions. It tastes somewhat less bitter than columbin. Bödeker surmises that it may exist in combination with the berberine.

Bödeker has pointed out a connection between the three bitter principles of calumba. If we suppose a molecule of ammonia, NH₃, to be added to columbin C₄₂H₄₄O₁₄, the complex molecule thence resulting will contain the elements of berberine C₂₀H₁₇NO₄, columbic acid C₂₂H₂₄O₇, and water 3H₂O.

Among the more usual constituents of plants, calumba contains (in addition to starch) pectin, gum, and nitrate of potassium, but no tannic acid. It yields when incinerated 6 per cent. of ash.

Commerce—Calumba root is shipped to Europe and India from Mozambique and Zanzibar, and exported from Bombay and other Indian ports.

Uses—It is much employed as a mild tonic, chiefly in the form of tincture or of aqueous infusion.

PAREIRA BRAVA.

Radix Pareiræ; Pareira-Brava[111]; F. Racine de Butua ou de Pareira-Brava; G. Grieswurzel.

Botanical Origin—Chondodendron tomentosum Ruiz et Pav. (non Eichler) (Cocculus Chondodendron DC., Botryopsis platyphylla Miers[112]).—It is a lofty climbing shrub with long woody stems, and leaves as much as a foot in length. The latter are of variable form, but mostly broadly ovate, rounded or pointed at the extremity, slightly cordate at the base, and having long petioles. They are smooth on the upper side; on the under covered between the veins with a fine close tomentum of an ashy hue. The flowers are unisexual, racemose, minute, produced either from the young shoots or from the woody stems. The fruits are ¾ of an inch long, oval, black and much resembling grapes in form and arrangement.[113]

The plant grows in Peru and Brazil,—in the latter country in the neighbourhood of Rio de Janeiro, where it occurs in some abundance on the range of hills separating the Copacabana from the basin of the Rio de Janeiro. It is also found about San Sebastian further south.

History—The Portuguese missionaries who visited Brazil in the 17th century became acquainted with a root known to the natives as Abutua or Butua, which was regarded as possessing great virtues. As the plant affording it was a tall climbing shrub with large, simple, long-stalked leaves, and bore bunches of oval berries resembling grapes, the Portuguese gave it the name of Parreira brava or Wild Vine.

The root was brought to Lisbon where its reputed medicinal powers attracted the notice of many persons, and among others of Michel Amelot, ambassador of Louis XIV., who took back some of it when he returned to Paris in 1688. Specimens of the drug also reached the botanist Tournefort, and one presented by him to Pomet was figured and described by the latter in 1694.[114] The drug was again brought to Paris by Louis-Raulin Rouillé, the successor to Amelot at Lisbon, together with a memoir detailing its numerous virtues.

Specimens obtained in Brazil by a naval officer named De la Mare in the early part of the last century, were laid before the French Academy, which body requested a report upon them from Geoffroy, professor of medicine and pharmacy in the College of France, who was already somewhat acquainted with the new medicine. He reported many favourable trials in cases of inflammations of the bladder and suppression of urine.[115] The drug was a favourite remedy of Helvetius,[116] physician to Louis XIV. and Louis XV., who administered it for years with great success.

Both Geoffroy and Helvetius were in frequent correspondence with Sloane[117] who received from the former as well as from other sources specimens of Pareira Brava, which are still in the British Museum and have enabled us fully to identify the drug as the root of Chondodendron tomentosum.

Several other plants of the order Menispermaceæ have stems or roots employed in South America in the same manner as Chondodendron. Pomet had heard of two varieties of Pareira Brava, and two were known to Geoffroy.[118] Lochner of Nürnberg who published a treatise on Pareira Brava in 1719[119] brought forward a plant of Eastern Africa figured in 1675 by Zanoni,[120] and supposed to be the mother plant of the drug. A species of Cissampelos called by the Portuguese in Brazil Caapeba, Cipó de Cobras or Herva de Nossa Senhora described by Piso in 1648,[121] afterwards became associated with Pareira Brava on account of similarity of properties.

Thus was introduced a confusion which we may say was consolidated when Linnæus in 1753,[122] founded a species as Cissampelos Pareira, citing it as the source of Pareira Brava,—a confusion which has lasted for more than a hundred years. This plant is very distinct from that yielding true Pareira Brava, and though its roots and stems are used medicinally in the West Indies,[123] there is nothing to prove that they were ever an object of export to Europe.

As Pareira Brava failed to realise the extravagant pretensions claimed for it, it gradually fell out of use,[124] and the characters of the true drug became forgotten. This at least seems to be the explanation of the fact that for many years past the Pareira Brava found in the shops and supposed to be genuine is a substance very diverse from the original drug,—albeit not devoid of medicinal properties. More recently even this has become scarce, and an inert Pareira Brava has been almost the sole kind obtainable. The true drug has however still at times appeared in the European market, and attention having been directed to it,[125] we may hope that it will arrive in a regular manner.

The re-introduction of Pareira Brava into medical practice is due (so far as Great Britain is concerned) to Brodie[126] who recommended it in 1828 for inflammation of the bladder.

Description—True Pareira Brava as derived from Chondodendron tomentosum is a long, branching, woody root, attaining 2 inches or more in diameter, but usually met with much smaller and dividing into rootlets no thicker than a quill or even than a horse-hair. It is remarkably tortuous or serpentine and marked with transverse ridges as well as with constrictions and cracks more or less conspicuous; besides which the surface is strongly wrinkled longitudinally. The bark is of a dark blackish brown or even quite black when free from earth, and disposed to exfoliate. The root breaks with a coarse fibrous fracture; the inner substance is of a light yellowish-brown,—sometimes of a dull greenish brown.

Roots of about an inch in diameter cut transversely exhibit a central column 0·2 to 0·4 of an inch in diameter composed of 10 to 20 converging wedges of large-pored woody tissue with 3 or 4 zones divided from each other by a wavy light-coloured line. Crossing these zones are wedge-shaped woody rays, often rather sparsely and irregularly distributed. The interradial substance has a close, resinous, waxy appearance.

The root though hard is easily shaved with a knife, some pieces giving the impression when cut of a waxy, rather than of a woody and fibrous substance. The taste is bitter, well marked but not persistent. The drug has no particular odour. Its aqueous decoction is turned inky bluish-black by tincture of iodine.

The aerial stems especially differ by enclosing a small but well-defined pith.

Microscopic Structure—The most interesting character consists in the arrangement rather than in the peculiarity of the tissues composing this drug. The wavy light-coloured lines already mentioned are built up partly of sclerenchymatous cells. The other portions of the parenchyme are loaded with large starch granules, which are much less abundant in the stem.

Chemical Composition—From the examination of this drug made by one of us in 1869,[127] it was shown that the bitter principle is the same as that discovered in 1839 by Wiggers in the drug hereafter described as Common False Pareira Brava, and named by him Pelosine. It was further pointed out that this body possesses the chemical properties of the Bibirine of Greenheart bark and of the Buxine obtained by Walz from the bark of Buxus sempervirens L. It was also obtained on the same occasion (1869) from the stems and roots of Cissampelos Pareira L. collected in Jamaica; but from both drugs in the very small proportion of about ½ per cent.

Whether to Buxine (for by this name rather than Pelosine it should be designated) is due the medicinal power of the drug may well be doubted. No further chemical examination of true Pareira Brava has been made.

Uses—The medicine is prescribed in chronic catarrhal affections of the bladder and in calculus. From its extensive use in Brazil[128] it seems deserving of trial in other complaints. Helvetius used to give it in substance, which in 5-grain doses was taken in infusion made with boiling water from the powdered root and not strained.

Substitutes—We have already pointed out how the name Pareira Brava has been applied to several other drugs than that described in the foregoing pages. We shall now briefly notice the more important.

1. Stems and roots of Cissampelos Pareira L.—Owing to the difficulty of obtaining good Pareira Brava in the London market, although this plant is very widely diffused over all the tropical regions of both hemispheres, the firm of which one of us was formerly a member (Messrs. Allen and Hanburys, Plough Court, Lombard Street) caused to be collected in Jamaica, under the superintendence of Mr. N. Wilson, of the Bath Botanical Gardens, the stems and root of Cissampelos Pareira L., of which it imported in 1866-67-68 about 300 lb. It was found impracticable to obtain the root per se; and the greater bulk of the drug consisted of long cylindrical stems,[129] many of which had been decumbent and had thrown out rootlets at the joints. They had very much the aspect of the climbing stems of Clematis vitalba L., and varied from the thickness of a quill to that of the forefinger, seldom attaining the diameter of an inch. The stems have a light brown bark marked longitudinally with shallow furrows and wrinkles, which sometimes take a spiral direction. Knots one to three feet apart, sometimes throwing out a branch, also occur. The root is rather darker in colour, but not very different in structure from the stem.

The fracture of the stem is coarse and fibrous. The transverse section, whether of stem or root, shows a thickish, corky bark surrounding a light brown wood composed of a number of converging wedges (10 to 20) of very porous structure, separated by narrow medullary rays. There are no concentric layers of wood,[130] nor is the arrangement of the wedges oblique as in many other stems of the order. The drug is inodorous, but has a very bitter taste without sweetness or astringency.

2. Common False Pareira Brava—Under this name we designate the drug which for many years past has been the ordinary Pareira Brava of the shops, and regarded until lately as derived from Cissampelos Pareira L. We have long endeavoured to ascertain, through correspondents in Brazil, from what plant it is derived, but without success. We only know that it belongs to the order Menispermaceæ.

The drug consists of a ponderous, woody, tortuous stem and root, occurring in pieces from a few inches to a foot or more in length, and from 1 to 4 inches in thickness, coated with a thin, hard, dark brown bark. The pieces are cylindrical, four-sided, or more or less flattened—sometimes even to the extent of becoming ribbon-like. In transverse section, their structure appears very remarkable. Supposing the piece to be stem, a well-defined pith will be found to occupy the centre of the first-formed wood, which is a column about ¼ of an inch in diameter. This is succeeded by 10 to 15 or more concentric or oftener eccentric zones, ⅒ to ²/₁₀ of an inch wide, each separated from its neighbour by a layer of parenchyme, the outermost being coated with a true bark. In pieces of true root, the pith is reduced to a mere point.

Sometimes the development of the zones has been so irregular that they have formed themselves entirely on one side of the primitive column, the other being coated with bark. The zones, including the layer, around the pith (if pith is present), are crossed by numerous small medullary rays. These do not run from the centre to the circumference, but traverse only their respective zones, on the outside of which they are arched together.

The drug, when of good quality, has its wood firm, compact, and of a dusky yellowish-brown hue, and a well-marked bitter taste. It exhibits under the knife nothing of the close waxy texture seen in the root of Chondodendron, but cuts as a tough, fibrous wood. Its decoction is not tinged blue by iodine. It was in this drug that Wiggers in 1839 discovered pelosine.

The drug just described, which is by no means devoid of medicinal power, has of late years been almost entirely supplanted in the market by another sort consisting exclusively of stems which are devoid of bitterness and appear to be wholly inert. They are in the form of sticks or truncheons, mostly cylindrical. Cut traversely, they display the same structure as the sort last described, with a well-defined pith. The wood is light in weight, of a dull tint, and disposed to split. The bark, which consists of two layers, is easily detached.

3. Stems of Chondodendron tomentosum R. et P.—These have been recently imported from Brazil, and sold as Pareira Brava.[131] The drug consists of truncheons about 1½ feet in length, of a rather rough and knotty stem, from 1 to 4 inches thick.[132] The larger pieces, which are sometimes hollow with age, display, when cut traversely, a small number (5-9) nearly concentric woody zones. The youngest pieces have the bark dotted over with small dark warts.

The wood is inodorous, but has a bitterish taste like the root, of which it is probably an efficient representative. Some pieces have portions of root springing from them, and detached roots occur here and there among the bits of stem. The structure and development of the latter has been elaborately examined and figured by Moss,[133] and also by Lanessan,[134] in the French translation of our book.

4. White Pareira Brava—Stems and roots of Abuta rufescens Aublet.—Mr. J. Correa de Méllo of Campinas has been good enough to send to one of us (H.) a specimen of the root and leaves[135] of this plant, marked Parreira Brava grande. The former we have identified with a drug received from Rio de Janeiro as Abutua Unha de Vaca, i.e. Cowhoof Abutua, and also with a similar drug found in the London market. Aublet[136] states that the root of Abuta rufescens was, in the time of his visit to French Guiana, shipped from that colony to Europe as Pareira Brava Blanc (White Pareira Brava).

This name is well applicable to the drug before us, which consists of short pieces of a root, ½ an inch to 3 inches thick, covered with a rough blackish bark, and also of bits of stem having a pale, striated, corky bark. Cut transversely, the root displays a series of concentric zones of white amylaceous cellular tissue, each beautifully marked with narrow wedge-shaped medullary rays of dark, porous tissue. The wood of the stem is harder than that of the root, the medullary rays are closer together and broader, and there is a distinct pith.

The wood, neither of root nor stem, has any taste or smell. A decoction of the root is turned bright blue by iodine.

5. Yellow Pareira Brava—This drug, of which a quantity was in the hands of a London drug-broker in 1873, is, we presume, the Pareira Brava jaune of Aublet—the bitter tasting stem of his “Abuta amara folio levi cordiformi ligno flavescente,”—a plant of Guiana unknown to recent botanists. That which we have seen consists of portions of a hard woody stem, from 1 to 5 or 6 inches in diameter, covered with a whitish bark. Internally it is marked by numerous regular concentric zones, is of a bright yellow colour and of a bitter taste. It contains berberine. The same drug, apparently, was exhibited in the Paris exposition of 1878 as “Liane amère” from French Guiana.

COCCULUS INDICUS.

Fructus Cocculi; Cocculus Indicus; F. Coque du Levant; G. Kokkelskörner.

Botanical Origin—Anamirta paniculata Colebrooke, 1822 (Menispermum Cocculus L.; Anamirta Cocculus Wight et Arnott, 1834), a strong climbing shrub found in the eastern parts of the Indian peninsula from Concan and Orissa to Malabar and Ceylon, in Eastern Bengal, Khasia and Assam, and in the Malayan Islands.

History—It is commonly asserted that Cocculus Indicus was introduced into Europe through the Arabs, but the fact is difficult of proof; for though Avicenna[137] and other early writers mention a drug having the power of poisoning fish, they describe it as a bark, and make no allusion to it as a production of India. Even Ibn Baytar[138] in the 13th century professed his inability to discover what substance the older Arabian authors had in view.

Cocculus Indicus is not named by the writers of the School of Salerno. The first mention of it we have met with is by Ruellius,[139] who, alluding to the property possessed by the roots of Aristolochia and Cyclamen of attracting fishes, states that the same power exists in the little berries found in the shops under the name of Cocci Orientis, which when scattered on water stupify the fishes, so that they may be captured by the hand.

Valerius Cordus[140] thought the drug which he calls Cuculi de Levante to be the fruit of a Solanum growing in Egypt.

Dalechamps[141] repeated this statement in 1586, at which period and for long afterwards, Cocculus Indicus used to reach Europe from Alexandria and other parts of the Levant. Gerarde,[142] who gives a very good figure of it, says it is well known in England (1597) as Cocculus Indicus, otherwise Cocci vel Cocculæ Orientales, and that it is used for destroying vermin and poisoning fish. In 1635 it was subject to an import duty of 2s. per lb., as Cocculus Indiæ.[143]

The use of Cocculus Indicus in medicine was advocated by Battista Codronchi, a celebrated Italian physician of the 16th century, in a tractate entitled De Baccis Orientalibus.[144] In the “Pinax” Caspar Bauhin (about 1660) states that Cocculæ officinarum “saepe racematim pediculis hærentes, hederæ corymborum modo, ex Alexandria adferuntur.”

The word Cocculus is derived from the Italian coccola, signifying a small, berry-like fruit.[145] Mattioli remarks that as the berries when first brought from the East to Italy had no special name, they got to be called Coccole di Levante.[146]

Description—The female flower of Anamirta has normally 5 ovaries placed on a short gynophore. The latter, as it grows, becomes raised into a stalk about ½ an inch long, articulated at the summit with shorter stalks, each supporting a drupe, which is a matured ovary. The purple drupes thus produced are 1 to 3 in number, of gibbous ovoid form, with the persistent stigma on the straight side, and in a line with the shorter stalk or carpodium. They grow in a pendulous panicle, a foot or more in length.

These fruits removed from their stalks and dried have the aspect of little round berries, and constitute the Cocculus Indicus of commerce. As met with in the market they are shortly ovoid or subreniform, ⁴/₁₀ to ⁵/₁₀ of an inch long, with a blackish, wrinkled surface, and an obscure ridge running round the back. The shorter stalk, when present, supports the fruit very obliquely. The pericarp, consisting of a wrinkled skin covering a thin woody endocarp, encloses a single reniform seed, into which the endocarp deeply intrudes. In transverse section the seed has a horseshoe form; it consists chiefly of albumen, enclosing a pair of large, diverging lanceolate cotyledons, with a short terete radicle.[147]

The seed is bitter and oily, the pericarp tasteless. The drug is preferred when of dark colour, free from stalks, and fresh, with the seeds well-preserved.

Microscopic Structure—The woody endocarp is built up of a peculiar sclerenchymatous tissue, consisting of branched, somewhat elongated cells. They are densely packed, and run in various directions, showing but small cavities. The parenchyme of the seed is loaded with crystallized fatty matter.

Chemical Composition—Picrotoxin, a crystallizable substance occurring in the seed to the extent of ⅖ to 1 per cent., was observed by Boullay, as early as 1812, and is the source of the poisonous property of the drug. Picrotoxin does not neutralize acids. It dissolves in water and in alkalis; the solution in the latter reduces cupric or bismutic oxide like the sugars, but to a much smaller extent than glucose. The alcoholic solutions deviate the ray of polarized light to the left. The aqueous solution of picrotoxin is not altered by any metallic salt, or by tannin, iodic acid, iodohydrargyrate or bichromate of potassium—in fact by none of the reagents which affect the alkaloids. It may thus be easily distinguished from the bitter poisonous alkaloids, although in its behaviour with concentrated sulphuric acid and bichromate of potassium it somewhat resembles strychnine, as shown in 1867 by Köhler.

Picrotoxin melts at 200° C.; its composition, C₉H₁₀O₄, as ascertained in 1877 by Paternò and Oglialoro, is the same as that of everninic, hydrocoffeïc, umbellic and veratric (or dimethyl-protocatechuic acid—see Semen Sabadillæ) acids.

Pelletier and Couerbe (1833) obtained from the pericarp of Cocculus Indicus two crystallizable, tasteless, non-poisonous substances, having the same composition, and termed respectively Menispermine and Paramenispermine. These bodies, as well as the very doubtful amorphous Hypopicrotoxic Acid of the same chemists, require re-examination.

The fat of the seed, which amounts to about half its weight, is used in India for industrial purposes. Its acid constituent, formerly regarded as a peculiar substance under the name of Stearophanic or Anamirtic Acid, was found by Heintz to be identical with stearic acid.

Commerce—Cocculus Indicus is imported from Bombay and Madras, but we have no statistics showing to what extent. The stock in the dock warehouses of London on 1st of December, 1873, was 1168 packages, against 2010 packages on the same day of the previous year. The drug is mostly shipped to the Continent, the consumption in Great Britain being very small.

Uses—In British medicine Cocculus Indicus is only employed as an ingredient of an ointment for the destruction of pediculi. It has been discarded from the British Pharmacopœia, but has a place in that of India.

GULANCHA.

Caulis et radix Tinosporæ.

Botanical Origin—Tinospora cordifolia Miers (Cocculus cordifolius DC.), a lofty climbing shrub found throughout tropical India from Kumaon to Assam and Burma, and from Concan to Ceylon and the Carnatic.[148] It is called in Hindustani Gulancha; in Bombay the drug is known under the name of Goolwail.

History—The virtues of this plant which appear to have been long familiar to the Hindu physicians, attracted the attention of Europeans in India at the early part of the present century.[149] According to a paper published at Calcutta in 1827,[150] the parts used are the stem, leaves, and root, which are given in decoction, infusion, or a sort of extract called pálo, in a variety of diseases attended with slight febrile symptoms.

O’Shaughnessy declares the plant to be one of the most valuable in India, and that it has proved a very useful tonic. Similar favourable testimony is borne by Waring. Gulancha was admitted to the Bengal Pharmacopœia of 1844, and to the Pharmacopœia of India of 1868.

Description—The stems are perennial, twining and succulent, running over the highest trees and throwing out roots many yards in length which descend like slender cords to the earth. They have a thick corky bark marked with little prominent tubercles.

As found in the bazaars the drug occurs as short transverse segments of a cylindrical woody stem from ¼ of an inch up to 2 inches in diameter. They exhibit a shrunken appearance, especially those derived from the younger stems, and are covered with a smooth, translucent, shrivelled bark which becomes dull and rugose with age. Many of the pieces are marked with warty prominences and the scars of adventitious roots. The outer layer which is easily detached covers a shrunken parenchyme. The transverse section of the stem shows it to be divided by about 12 to 14 medullary rays into the same number of wedge-shaped woody bundles having very large vessels, but no concentric structure. The drug is inodorous but has a very bitter taste. The root is stated by O’Shaughnessy[151] to be large, soft, and spongy.

Microscopic Structure—The suberous coat consists of alternating layers of flat corky cells and sclerenchyme, sometimes of a yellow colour. The structure of the central part reminds one of that of Cissampelos Pareira ([p. 28]), like which it is not divided into concentric zones. The woody rays which are sometimes intersected by parenchyme, are surrounded by a loose circle of arched bundles of liber tissue.

Chemical Composition—No analysis worthy of the name has been made of this drug, and the nature of its bitter principle is wholly unknown. We have had no material at our disposal sufficient for chemical examination.

Uses—Gulancha is reputed to be tonic, antiperiodic and diuretic. According to Waring[152] it is useful in mild forms of intermittent fever, in debility after fevers and other exhausting diseases, in secondary syphilitic affections and chronic rheumatism.

Substitute—Tinospora crispa Miers, an allied species occurring in Silhet, Pegu, Java, Sumatra, and the Philippines, possesses similar properties, and is highly esteemed in the Indian Archipelago as a febrifuge.

BERBERIDEÆ.

CORTEX BERBERIDIS INDICUS.

Indian Barberry Bark.

Botanical Origin—This drug is allowed in the Pharmacopœia of India to be taken indifferently from three Indian species of Berberis[153] which are the following:—

1. Berberis aristata DC., a variable species occurring in the temperate regions of the Himalaya at 6000 to 10,000 feet elevation, also found in the Nilgiri mountains and Ceylon.[154]

2. B. Lycium, Royle, an erect, rigid shrub found in dry, hot situations of the western part of the Himalaya range at 3000 to 9000 feet above the sea-level.

3. B. asiatica Roxb.—This species has a wider distribution than the last, being found in the dry valleys of Bhutan and Nepal whence it stretches westward along the Himalaya to Garhwal, and occurs again in Afghanistan.

History—The medical practitioners of ancient Greece and Italy made use of a substance called Lycium, (λύκιον) of which the best kind was brought from India. It was regarded as a remedy of great value in restraining inflammatory and other discharges; but of all the uses to which it was applied the most important was the treatment of various forms of ophthalmic inflammation.

Lycium is mentioned by Dioscorides, Pliny, Celsus, Galen, and Scribonius Largus; by such later Greek writers as Paulus Ægineta, Ætius, and Oribasius, as well as by the Arabian physicians.

The author of the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea who probably lived in the 1st century, enumerates λύκιον as one of the exports of Barbarike at the mouth of the Indus, and also names it along with Bdellium and Costus among the commodities brought to Barygaza:—and further, lycium is mentioned among the Indian drugs on which duty was levied at the Roman custom-house of Alexandria about a.d. 176-180.[155]

An interesting proof of the esteem in which it was held is afforded by some singular little vases or jars of which a few specimens are preserved in collections of Greek antiquities.[156] These vases were made to contain lycium, and in them it was probably sold; for an inscription on the vessel not only gives the name of the drug but also that of a person who, we may presume, was either the seller or the inventor of the composition. Thus we have the Lycium of Jason, of Musæus, and of Heracleus. The vases bearing the name of Jason were found at Tarentum, and there is reason to believe that that marked Heracleus was from the same locality. Whether it was so or not, we know that a certain Heraclides of Tarentum is mentioned by Celsus[157] on account of his method of treating certain diseases of the eye; and that Galen gives formulæ for ophthalmic medicines[158] on the authority of the same person.

Innumerable conjectures were put forth during at least three centuries as to the origin and nature of lycium, and especially of that highly esteemed kind that was brought from India.

In the year 1833, Royle[159] communicated to the Linnean Society of London a paper proving that the Indian Lycium of the ancients was identical with an extract prepared from the wood or root of several species of Berberis growing in Northern India, and that this extract, well known in the bazaars as Rusot or Rasot, was in common use among the natives in various forms of eye disease.[160] This substance attracted considerable notice in India, and though its efficacy per se[161] seemed questionable, it was administered with benefit as a tonic and febrifuge.[162] But the rusot of the natives being often badly prepared or adulterated, the bark of the root has of late been used in its place, and in consequence of its acknowledged efficacy has been admitted to the Pharmacopœia of India.

Description.—In B. asiatica (the only species we have examined) the roots which are thick and woody, and internally of a bright yellow, are covered with a thin, brittle bark. The bark has a light-brown corky layer, beneath which it appears of a darker and greenish yellow hue, and composed of coarse fibres running longitudinally. The inner surface has a glistening appearance by reason of fine longitudinal striæ. The bark is inodorous and very bitter.

Chemical Composition.—Solly[163] pointed out in 1843 that the root-bark of the Ceylon barberry [B. aristata] contains the same yellow colouring matter as the barberry of Europe. L. W. Stewart[164] extracted Berberine in abundance from the barberry of theNilgiri Hills and Northern India, and presented specimens of it to one of us in 1865.

The root-bark of Berberis vulgaris L. was found by Polex (1836) to contain another alkaloid named Oxyacanthine, which forms with acids colourless crystallizable salts of bitter taste.[165]

Uses.—The root-bark of the Indian barberries administered as a tincture has been found extremely useful in India in the treatment of fevers of all types. It has also been given with advantage in diarrhœa and dyspepsia, and as a tonic for general debility. In the collection of the Chinese customs at Paris, in 1878, the root-barks of Berberis Lycium and B. chinensis, from the province of Shensi, were likewise exhibited (No. 1,823) as a tonic.

RHIZOMA PODOPHYLLI.

Radix podophylli; Podophyllum Root.

Botanical Origin—Podophyllum peltatum L., a perennial herb growing in moist shady situations throughout the eastern side of the North American continent from Hudson’s Bay to New Orleans and Florida.

The stem about a foot high, bears a large, solitary, white flower, rising from between two leaves of the size of the hand composed of 5 to 7 wedge-shaped divisions, somewhat lobed and toothed at the apex. The yellowish pulpy fruit of the size of a pigeon’s egg is slightly acid and is sometimes eaten under the name of May Apple. The leaves partake of the active properties of the root.

History—The virtues of the rhizome as an anthelminthic and emetic have been long known to the Indians of North America. The plant was figured in 1731 by Catesby[166] who remarks that its root is an excellent emetic. Its cathartic properties were noticed by Schöpf[167] and Barton[168] and have been commented upon by many subsequent writers. In 1820, podophyllum was introduced into the United States Pharmacopœia, and in 1864 into the British Pharmacopœia. Hodgson published in 1832 in the Journal of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy[169] the first attempt of a chemical examination of the rhizome, which now furnishes one of the most popular purgatives, the so-called Podophyllin, manufactured on a large scale at Cincinnati and in other places in America, as well as in England.

Description—The drug consists of the rhizome and rootlets. The former creeps to a length of several feet, but as imported is mostly in somewhat flattened pieces of 1 to 8 inches in length and 2 to 4 lines in longest diameter: it is marked by knotty joints showing a depressed scar at intervals of a few inches which marks the place of a fallen stem. Each joint is in fact the growth of one year, the terminal bud being enclosed in papery brownish sheaths. Sometimes the knots produce one, two, or even three lateral buds and the rhizome is bi- or tri-furcate. The reddish-brown or grey surface is obscurely marked at intervals by oblique wrinkles indicating the former attachment of rudimentary leaves. The rootlets are about ½ a line thick and arise from below the knots and adjacent parts of the rhizome, the internodal space being bare. They are brittle, easily detached, and commonly of a paler colour. The rhizome is mostly smooth, but some of the branched pieces are deeply furrowed. Both rootstock and rootlets have a short, smooth, mealy fracture; the transverse section is white, exhibiting only an extremely small corky layer and a thin simple circle of about 20 to 40 yellow, vascular bundles, enclosing a central pith which in the larger pieces is often 2 lines in diameter.

The drug has a heavy narcotic, disagreeable odour, and a bitter, acrid, nauseous taste.

Microscopic Structure—The vascular bundles are composed of spiral and scalariform vessels intermixed with cambial tissue. From each bundle a narrow-tissued, wedge-or crescent-shaped liber-bundle projects a little into the cortical layer. This, as well as the pith, exhibits large thin-walled cells. The rootlets are as usual of a different structure, their central part consisting of one group of vascular bundles more or less scattered.[170] The parenchymatous cells of the drug are loaded with starch granules; some also contain stellate tufts of oxalate of calcium.

Chemical Composition—The active principles of podophyllum exist in the resin, which according to Squibb[171] is best prepared by the process termed re-percolation. The powdered drug is exhausted by alcohol which is made to percolate through successive portions. The strong tincture thus obtained is slowly poured into a large quantity of water acidulated with hydrochloric acid (one measure of acid to 70 of water), and the precipitated resin dried at a temperature not exceeding 32° C. The acid is used to facilitate the subsidence of the pulverulent resin which according to Maisch settles down but very slowly if precipitated by cold water simply, and if thrown down by hot water fuses into a dark brown cake. The resin redissolved in alcohol and again precipitated by acidulated water, after thorough washing with distilled water and finally drying over sulphuric acid, amounts to about 2 per cent.

Resin of podophyllum is a light, brownish-yellow powder with a tinge of green, devoid of crystalline appearance, becoming darker if exposed to a heat above 32° C., and having an acrid, bitter taste; it is very incorrectly called Podophyllin. The product is the same whether the rhizome or the rootlets are exclusively employed.[172] It is soluble in caustic, less freely in carbonated alkalis, even in ammonia, and is precipitated, apparently without alteration, on addition of an acid. Ether separates it into two nearly equal portions, the one soluble in the menstruum, the other not, but both energetically purgative. From the statements of Credner[173] it appears that if caustic lye is shaken with the ethereal solution, about half the resin combines with the potash, while the other half remains dissolved in the ether. If an acid is added to the potassic solution a red-brown precipitate is produced which is no longer soluble in ether nor possessed of purgative power. According to Credner, the body of greatest purgative activity was precipitated by ether from an alcoholic solution of crude podophyllin.

By exhausting the resin with boiling water, Power found that finally not more than 20 per cent. of the resin remained undissolved. By melting the crude resin with caustic soda, a little protocatechuic acid was obtained.

F. F. Mayer[174] of New York stated podophyllum to contain, beside the resin already mentioned, a large proportion of Berberine, a colourless alkaloid, an odoriferous principle which might be obtained by sublimation in colourless scales, and finally Saponin. From all these bodies the resin as prepared by Power,[175] was ascertained by him to be destitute; he especially proved the absence of berberine in Podophyllum.

Uses—Podophyllum is only employed for the preparation of the resin (Resina Podophylli) which is now much prescribed as a purgative.

PAPAVERACEÆ.

PETALA RHŒADOS.

Flores Rhœados; Red Poppy Petals; F. Fleurs de Coquelicot; G. Klatschrosen.

Botanical Origin—Papaver Rhœas L.—The common Red Poppy or Corn Rose is an annual herb found in fields throughout the greater part of Europe often in extreme abundance. It almost always occurs as an accompaniment of cereal crops, frequently disappearing when this cultivation is given up. It is plentiful in England and Ireland, but less so in Scotland; is found abundantly in Central and Southern Europe and in Asia Minor, whence it extends as far as Abyssinia, Palestine, and the banks of the Euphrates. But it does not occur in India or in North America.

From the evidence adduced by De Candolle[176] it would appear that the plant is strictly indigenous to Sicily, Greece, Dalmatia, and possibly the Caucasus.

History—Papaver Rhœas was known to the ancients, though doubtless it was often confounded with P. dubium L. the flowers of which are rather smaller and paler. The petals were used in pharmacy in Germany in the 15th century.[177]

Description—The branches of the stem are upright, each terminating in a conspicuous long-stalked flower, from which as it opens the two sepals fall off. The delicate scarlet petals are four in number, transversely elliptical and attached below the ovary by very short, dark violet claws. As they are broader than long, their edges overlap in the expanded flower. In the bud they are irregularly crumpled, but when unfolded are smooth, lustrous, and unctuous to the touch. They fall off very quickly, shrink up in drying, and assume a brownish-violet tint even when dried with the utmost care. Although they do not contain a milky juice like the green parts of the plant, they have while fresh a strong narcotic odour and a faintly bitter taste.

Chemical Composition—The most important constituent of the petals is the colouring matter, still but very imperfectly known. According to L. Meier (1846) it consists of two acids, neither of which could be obtained other than in an amorphous state. The colouring matter is abundantly taken up by water or spirit of wine but not by ether. The aqueous infusion is not precipitated by alum, but yields a dingy violet precipitate with acetate of lead, and is coloured blackish-brown by ferric salts or by alkalis.

The alkaloids of opium cannot be detected in the petals. Attfield in particular has examined the latter (1873) for morphine but without obtaining a trace of that body.

The milky juice of the herb and capsules has a narcotic odour, and appears to exert a distinctly sedative action. Hesse obtained from them (1865) a colourless crystallizable substance, Rhœadine, C₂₁H₂₁NO₆, of weak alkaline reaction. It is tasteless, not poisonous, nearly insoluble in water, alcohol, ether, chloroform, benzol, or aqueous ammonia, but dissolves in weak acids. Its solution in dilute sulphuric or hydrochloric acid acquires after a time a splendid red colour, destroyed by an alkali but reappearing on addition of an acid. Hesse further believes (1877) the milky juice to contain meconic acid.

Uses—Red Poppy petals are employed in pharmacy only for the sake of their fine colouring matter. They should be preferred in the freshstate.

CAPSULÆ PAPAVERIS.

Fructus Papaveris; Poppy Capsules, Poppy Heads; F. Capsules ou Têtes de Pavot; G. Mohnkapseln.

Botanical Origin—Papaver somniferum L. Independently of the garden-forms of this universally known annual plant, we may, following Boissier,[178] distinguish three principal varieties, viz.:—

α. setigerum (P. setigerum DC), occurring in the Peloponnesus, Cyprus, Corsica and the islands of Hières, the truly wild form of the plant with acutely toothed leaves, the lobes sharp-pointed, and each terminating in a bristle. The leaves, peduncles, and sepals are covered with scattered bristly hairs, and the stigmata are 7 or 8 in number.

β. glabrum—Capsule subglobular, stigmata 10 to 12. Chiefly cultivated in Asia Minor and Egypt.

γ. album (P. officinale Gmelin)—has the capsule more or less egg-shaped and devoid of apertures. It is cultivated in Persia.

Besides the differences indicated above, the petals vary from white to red or violet, with usually a dark purplish spot at the base of each.[179] The seeds also vary from white to slate-coloured.

History—The poppy has been known from a remote period throughout the eastern countries of the Mediterranean, Asia Minor, and Central Asia, in all which regions its cultivation is of very ancient date.[180]

Syrup of poppies, a medicine still in daily use, is recommended as a sedative in catarrh and cough in the writings of the younger Mesue (ob. a.d. 1015) who studied at Bagdad, and subsequently resided at Cairo as physician to the Caliph of Egypt. Their medicinal use seems to have reached Europe at an early period, for the Welsh “Physicians of Myddvai” in the 13th century already stated:[181] “Poppy heads bruised in wine will induce a man to sleep soundly.” They even prepared pills with the juice of poppy, which they called opium. In the Ricettario Fiorentino (see Appendix R) a formula is given for the syrup as Syroppo di Papaveri semplici di Mesue; in the first pharmacopœia of the London College (1618), the medicine is prescribed as Syrupus de Meconio Mesuæ.

Description—The fruit is formed by the union of 8 to 20 carpels, the edges of which are turned inwards and project like partitions towards the interior, yet without reaching the centre, so that the fruit is really one-celled. In the unripe fruit, the sutures of the carpels are distinctly visible externally as shallow longitudinal stripes.

The fruit is crowned with a circular disc, deeply cut into angular ridge-like stigmas in number equal to the carpels, projecting in a stellate manner with short obtuse lobes. Each carpel opens immediately below the disc by a pore, out of which the seeds may be shaken; but in some varieties of poppy the carpel presents no aperture even when fully ripe. The fruit is globular, sometimes flattened below, or it is ovoid; it is contracted beneath into a sort of neck immediately above a tumid ring at its point of attachment with the stalk. Grown in rich moist ground in England, it often attains a diameter of three inches, which is twice that of the capsules of the opium poppy of Asia Minor or India. While growing it is of a pale glaucous green, but at maturity becomes yellowish-brown, often marked with black spots. The outer wall of the pericarp is smooth and hard; the rest is of a loose texture, and while green exudes on the slightest puncture an abundance of bitter milky juice. The interior surface of the pericarp is rugose, and minutely and beautifully striated transversely. From its sutures spring thin and brittle placentæ directed towards the centre and bearing on their perpendicular faces and edges a vast number of minute reniform seeds.

The unripe fruit has a narcotic odour which is destroyed by drying; and its bitter taste is but partially retained.

Microscopic Structure—The outer layer consists of a thin cuticle exhibiting a large number of stomata; the epidermis is formed of a row of small thick-walled cells. Fragments of these two layers, which on the whole exhibit no striking peculiarity, are always found in the residue of opium after it has been exhausted by water.

The most interesting part of the constituent tissues of the fruit is the system of laticiferous vessels, which is of an extremely complicated nature inasmuch as it is composed of various kinds of cells intimately interlaced so as to form considerable bundles.[182] The cells containing the milky juice are larger but not so much branched as in many other plants.

Chemical Composition—The analyses of poppy heads present discrepant results with regard to morphine. Merck and Winckler detected it in the ripe fruit to the extent of 2 per cent., and it has also been found by Groves (1854) and by Deschamps d’Avallon (1864). Other chemists have been unable to find it.

In recent pharmacopœias poppy heads are directed to be taken previous to complete maturity, and both Meurein and Aubergier have shown that in this state they are richer in morphine than when more advanced. Deschamps d’Avallon found them sometimes to contain narcotine. He also obtained mucilage perceptible by neutral acetate of lead, ammonium salts, meconic, tartaric, and citric acid, the ordinary mineral acids, wax, and lastly two new crystalline bodies, Papaverin, and Papaverosine. The former is not identical with Merck’s alkaloid of the same name; although nitrogenous and bitter, it has an acid reaction (?), yet does not combine with bases. It yields a blue precipitate with a solution of iodine in iodide of potassium.

Papaverosine on the other hand is a base to which sulphuric acid imparts a violet colour, changing to dark yellowish-red on addition of nitric acid.

In ripe poppy heads, Hesse (1866) found Rhœadine. Groves in 1854 somewhat doubtfully announced the presence of Codeine. Fricker[183] stated to have obtained from the capsules 0·10 per cent. of alkaloid, and Krause[184] was able to prove the presence of traces of morphine, narcotine, and meconic acid. Ripe poppy capsules (seeds removed) dried at 100° C. afforded us 14·28 per cent. of ash, consisting chiefly of alkaline chlorides and sulphates, with but a small quantity of phosphate.

Production—Poppies are grown for medicinal uses in many parts of England, mostly on a small scale. The large and fine fruits (poppy heads) are usually sold entire; the smaller and less slightly are broken and the seeds having been removed are supplied to the druggist for pharmaceutical preparations. The directions of the pharmacopœia as to the fruit being gathered when “nearly ripe” does not appear to be much regarded.

Uses—In the form of syrup and extract, poppy heads are in common use as a sedative. A hot decoction is often externally applied as an anodyne.

In upper India an intoxicating liquor is prepared by heating the capsules of the poppy with jagghery and water.[185]

OPIUM.

Botanical Origin—Papaver somniferum L., [see preceding article].

History[186]—The medicinal properties of the milky juice of the poppy have been known from a remote period. Theophrastus who lived in the beginning of the 3rd century b.c. was acquainted with the substance in question, under the name of Μηκώνιον. The investigations of Unger (1857; see Capsulæ Papaveris,) have failed to trace any acquaintance of ancient Egypt with opium.

Scribonius Largus in his Compositiones Medicamentorum[187] (circa a.d. 40) notices the method of procuring opium, and points out that the true drug is derived from the capsules, and not from the foliage of the plant.

About the year 77 of the same century, Dioscorides[188] plainly distinguished the juice of the capsules under the name of ὀπός from an extract of the entire plant, μηκώνειον, which he regarded as much less active. He described exactly how the capsules should be incised, the performing of which operation he designated by the verb ὀπίζειν. We may infer from these statements of Dioscorides that the collection of opium was at that early period a branch of industry in Asia Minor. The same authority alludes to the adulteration of the drug with the milky juices of Glaucium and Lactuca, and with gum.

Pliny[189] devotes some space to an account of Opion, of which he describes the medicinal use. The drug is repeatedly mentioned as Lacrima papaveris by Celsus in the 1st century, and more or less particularly by numerous later Latin authors. During the classical period of the Roman Empire as well as in the early middle ages, the only sort of opium known was that of Asia Minor.

The use of the drug was transmitted by the Arabs to the nations of the East, and in the first instance to the Persians. From the Greek word ὀπός, juice, was formed the Arabic word Afyun, which has found its way into many Asiatic languages.[190]

The introduction of opium into India seems to have been connected with the spread of Islamism, and may have been favoured by the Mahommedan prohibition of wine. The earliest mention of it as a production of that country occurs in the travels of Barbosa[191] who visited Calicut on the Malabar coast in 1511. Among the more valuable drugs the prices of which he quotes, opium occupies a prominent place. It was either imported from Aden or Cambay, that from the latter place being the cheaper, yet worth three or four times as much as camphor or benzoin.

Pyres[192] in his letter about Indian drugs to Manuel, king of Portugal, written from Cochin in 1516, speaks of the opium of Egypt, that of Cambay and of the kingdom of Coûs (Kus Bahár, S.W. of Bhotan) in Bengal. He adds that it is a great article of merchandize in these parts and fetches a good price;—that the kings and lords eat of it, and even the common people, though not so much because it costs dear.

Garçia d’Orta[193] informs us that the opium of Cambay in the middle of the 16th century was chiefly collected in Malwa, and that it is soft and yellowish. That from Aden and other places near the Erythrean Sea is black and hard. A superior kind was imported from Cairo, agreeing as Garçia supposed with the opium of the ancient Thebaïd, a district of Upper Egypt near the modern Karnak and Luksor.

In India the Mogul Government uniformly sold the opium monopoly, and the East India Company followed their example, reserving to itself the sole right of cultivating the poppy and selling the opium.

Opium thebaïcum was mentioned by Simon Januensis,[194] physician to Pope Nicolas IV. (a.d. 1288-92), who also alludes to meconium as the dried juice of the pounded capsules and leaves. Prosper Alpinus,[195] who visited Egypt in 1580-83, states that opium or meconium was in his time prepared in the Thebaïd from the expressed juice of poppy heads.

The German traveller Kämpfer, who visited Persia in 1685, describes the various kinds of opium prepared in that country. The best sorts were flavoured with nutmeg, cardamom, cinnamon and mace, or simply with saffron and ambergris. Such compositions were called Theriaka, and were held in great estimation during the middle ages, and probably supplied to a large extent the place of pure opium. It was not uncommon for the sultans of Egypt of the 15th century to send presents of Theriaka to the doges of Venice and the sovereigns of Cyprus.[196]

In Europe opium seems in later times not to have been reckoned among the more costly drugs; in the 16th century we find it quoted at the same price as benzoin, and much cheaper than camphor, rhubarb, or manna.[197]

With regard to China it is supposed that opium was first brought thither by the Arabians, who are known to have traded with the southern ports of the empire as early as the 9th century. More recently, at least until the 18th century, the Chinese imported the drug in their junks as a return cargo from India. At this period it was used almost exclusively as a remedy for dysentery, and the whole quantity imported was very small. It was not until 1767 that the importation reached 1,000 chests, at which rate it continued for some years, most of the trade being in the hands of the Portuguese. The East India Company made a small adventure in 1773; and seven years later an opium depôt of two small vessels was established by the English in Lark’s Bay, south of Macao.

The Chinese authorities began to complain of these two ships in 1793, but the traffic still increased, and without serious interruption until 1820, when an edict was issued forbidding any vessel having opium on board to enter the Canton river. This led to a system of contraband trade with the connivance of the Chinese officials, which towards the expiration of the East India Company’s charter in 1834 had assumed a regular character. The political difficulties between England and China that ensued shortly after this event, and the so-called Opium War, culminated in the Treaty of Nanking (1842), by which five ports of China were opened to foreign trade, and opium was in 1858 admitted as a legal article of commerce.[198]

The vice of opium-smoking began to prevail in China in the second half of the 17th century,[199] and in another hundred years had spread like a plague over the gigantic empire. The first edict against the practice was issued in 1796, since which there have been innumerable enactments and memorials,[200] but all powerless to arrest the evil which is still increasing in an alarming ratio. Mr. Hughes, Commissioner of Customs at Amoy, thus wrote on this subject in his official Trade Report[201] for the year 1870:—“Opium-smoking appears here as elsewhere in China to be becoming yearly a more recognized habit,—almost a necessity of the people. Those who use the drug now do so openly, and native public opinion attaches no odium to its use, so long as it is not carried to excess.... In the city of Amoy, and in adjacent cities and towns, the proportion of opium-smokers is estimated to be from 15 to 20 per cent. of the adult population.... In the country the proportion is stated to be from 5 to 10 per cent....”

Production—The poppy in whatever region it may grow always contains a milky juice possessing the same properties; and the collection of opium is possible in all temperate and subtropical countries where the rainfall is not excessive. But the production of the drug is limited by other conditions than soil and climate, among which the value of land and labour stands pre-eminent.

At the present day opium is produced on an important scale in Asia Minor, Persia, India, and China; to a small extent in Egypt. The drug has also been collected in Europe, Algeria,[202] North America,[203] and Australia[204] but more for the sake of experiment than as an object of commerce.

We shall describe the production of the different kinds under their several names.

1. Opium of Asia Minor; Turkey, Smyrna, or Constantinople Opium[205]—The poppy from which this most important kind of opium is obtained is Papaver somniferum, var. β. glabrum Boissier. The flowers are commonly purplish, but sometimes white, and the seeds vary from white to dark violet.

The cultivation is carried on throughout Asia Minor, both on the more elevated and the lower lands, the cultivators being mostly small peasant proprietors. The plant requires a naturally rich and moist soil, further improved by manure, not to mention much care and attention on the part of the grower. Spring frosts, drought, or locusts sometimes effect its complete destruction. The sowing takes place at intervals from November to March, partly to insure against risk of total failure, and partly in order that the plants may not all come to perfection at the same time.

The plants flower between May and July according to the elevation of the land. A few days after the fall of the petals the poppy head being about an inch and a half in diameter is ready for incision. The incision is made with a knife transversely, about half-way up the capsule, and extends over about two-thirds the circumference, or is carried spirally to beyond its starting point. Great nicety is required not to cut too deep so as to penetrate the capsule, as in that case some of the juice would flow inside and be lost. The incisions are generally made in the afternoon and the next morning are found covered with exuded juice. This is scraped off with a knife, the gatherer transferring it to a poppy leaf which he holds in his left hand. At every alternate scraping, the knife is wetted with saliva by drawing it through the mouth, the object being to prevent the adhesion of the juice to the blade. Each poppy-head is, as a rule, cut only once; but as a plant produces several heads all of which are not of proper age at the same time, the operation of incising and gathering has to be gone over two or three times on the same plot of ground.

As soon as a sufficient quantity of the half-dried juice has been collected to form a cake or lump, it is wrapped in poppy leaves and put for a short time to dry in the shade. There is no given size for cakes of opium, and they vary in weight from a few ounces to more than two pounds. In some villages it is the practice to make the masses larger than in others. Before the opium is ready for the market, a meeting of buyers and sellers is held in each district, at which the price to be asked is discussed and settled,—the peasants being most of them in debt to the buyers or merchants.

To the latter the opium is sold in a very soft but natural state. These dealers sometimes manipulate the soft drug with a wooden pestle into larger masses which they envelope in poppy leaves and pack in cotton bags sealed at the mouth for transport to Smyrna. According to another account, the opium as obtained from the grower is at once packed in bags together with a quantity of the little chaffy fruits of a dock (Rumex sp.) to prevent the lumps from sticking together, and so brought in baskets to Smyrna, or ports farther north.

The opium remains in the baskets (placed in cool warehouses to avoid loss of weight) till sold, and it is only on reaching the buyer’s warehouse that the seals are broken and the contents of the bags exposed. This is done in the presence of the buyer, seller, and a public examiner, the last of whom goes through the process of inspecting the drug piece by piece, throwing aside any of suspicions quality. Heffler of Smyrna asserts that the drug is divided into three qualities, viz.—the prime, which is not so much a selected quality as the opium of some esteemed districts,—the current, which is the mercantile quality and constitutes the great bulk of the crop,—and lastly the inferior or chiqinti.[206] The opium of very bad quality or wholly spurious he would place in a fourth category. Maltass applies the name chiqinti (or chicantee) to opium of every degree of badness.

The examination of opium by the official expert is not conducted in any scientific method. His opinion of the drug is based on colour, odour, appearance and weight, and appears to be generally very correct. Fayk Bey (1867) has recommended the Turkish government to adopt the more certain method of assaying opium by chemical means.

In Asia Minor the largest quantities of opium are now produced in the north-western districts of Karahissar Sahib, Balahissar, Kutaya, and Kiwa (or Geiveh), the last on the river Sakariyeh which runs into the Black Sea. These centres of large production of opium send a superior quality of the drug to Constantinople by way of Izmid; the best apparently from Bogaditch and Balikesri, near the Susurlu river. Angora and Amasia are other places in the north of Asia Minor whence opium is obtained.

In the centre of the peninsula Afium Karahissar (literally opium-black-castle) and Ushak are important localities for opium, which is also the case with Isbarta, Buldur and Hamid farther south. The product of these districts finds its way to Smyrna, in the immediate neighbourhood of which but little opium is produced. The export from Smyrna in 1871, in which year the crop was very large, was 5650 cases, valued at £784,500.[207]

Turkey Opium, as it is generally called in English trade, occurs in the form of rounded masses which according to their softness become more or less flattened or many-sided, or irregular by mutual pressure in the cases in which they are packed. There appears to be no rule as to their weight[208] which varies from an ounce up to more than 6 lb.; from ½ lb. to 2 lb. is however the most usual. The exterior is covered with the remains of poppy leaves strewn over with the Rumex chaff before alluded to, which together make the lumps sufficiently dry to be easily handled. The consistence is such that the drug can be readily cut with a knife, or moulded between the fingers. The interior is moist and coarsely granular, varying in tint from a light chestnut to a blackish brown. Fine shreds of the epidermis of the poppy capsule are perceptible even to the naked eye, but are still more evident if the residue of opium washed with water, is moistened with dilute chromic acid (1 to 100). The odour of Turkey opium is peculiar, and though commonly described as narcotic and unpleasant, is to many persons far from disagreeable. The taste is bitter.

The substances alleged to be used for adulterating Turkey opium are sand, pounded poppy capsules, pulp of apricots or figs, gum tragacanth or even turpentine. Bits of lead are sometimes found in the lumps, also stones and masses of clay.

2. Egyptian Opium,—though not abundant little as formerly is still met with in European commerce. It usually occurs in hard, flattish cakes about 4 inches in diameter covered with the remnants of a poppy leaf, but not strewn over with rumex-fruits. We have also seen it (1873) as freshly imported, in a soft and plastic state. The fractured surface of this opium (when hard) is finely porous, of a dark liver-colour, shining here and there from imbedded particles of quartz or gum, and reddish-yellow points (of resin?). Under the microscope an abundance of starch granules is sometimes visible. The morphine in a sample from Merck amounted to 6 per cent.

According to Von Kremer who wrote in 1863,[209] there were then in Upper Egypt near Esneh, Kenneh, and Siout, as much as 10,000 feddan (equal to about the same number of English acres) of land cultivated with the poppy from which opium was obtained in March, and seed in April. Hartmann[210] states that the cultivation is carried on by the government, and solely for the requirement of the sanitary establishments.

S. Stafford Allen in 1861 witnessed the collection of opium at Kenneh in Upper Egypt,[211] from a white-flowered poppy. An incision is made in the capsule by running a knife twice round it transversely, and the juice scraped off the following day with a sort of scoop-knife. The gatherings are collected on a leaf and placed in the sun to harden. The produce appeared extremely small and was said to be wholly used in the country.

Gastinel, director of the Experimental Garden at Cairo, and government inspector of pharmaceutical stores, has shown (1865) that the poppy in Egypt might yield a very good product containing 10 to 12 per cent. of morphine, and that the present bad quality of Egyptian opium is due to an over-moist soil, and a too early scarification of the capsule, whereby (not to mention wilful adulteration) the proportion of morphine is reduced to 3 or 4 per cent.

In 1872, 9636 lb. of opium, value £5023, were imported into the United Kingdom from Egypt.

3. Persian Opium.—Persia, probably the original home of the baneful practice of opium-eating, cultivates the drug chiefly in the central provinces where, according to Boissier, the plant grown to furnish it is Papaver somniferum, var. γ album (P. officinale Gm.) having ovate roundish capsules. Poppy heads from Persia which we saw at the Paris Exhibition in 1867, had vertical incisions and contained white seeds.

The strongest opium called in Persia Teriak-e-Arabistani is obtained in the neighbourhood of Dizful and Shuster, east of the Lower Tigris. Good opium is likewise produced about Sari and Balfarush in the province of Mazanderan, and in the southern province of Kerman. The lowest quality which is mixed with starch and other matters, is sold in light brown sticks; it is made at Shahabdulazim, Kashan, and Kum.[212] A large quantity of opium appears to be produced in Khokan and Turkestan.

Persian opium is carried overland to China through Bokhara, Khokan and Kashgar;[213] but since 1864 it has also been extensively conveyed thither by sea, and it is now quoted in trade reports like that of Malwa, Patna, and Benares.[214] It is exported by way of Trebizond to Constantinople where it used to be worked up to imitate the opium of Asia Minor, and at the same time adulterated.[215] Since 1870, Persian opium which was previously rarely seen as such in Europe, has been imported in considerable quantity, being shipped now from Bushire and Bunder Abbas, in the Persian Gulf, to London or to the Straits Settlements and China. It occurs in various forms, the most typical being a short rounded cone weighing 6 to 10 ounces. We have also seen it in flat circular cakes, 1¼ lb. in weight. In both forms the drug was of firm consistence, a good opium-smell, and internally brown of a comparatively light tint. The surface was strewn over with remnants of stalks and leaves. Some of it had been collected with the use of oil as in Malwa ([see p. 51]), which was apparent from the greasiness of the cone, and the globules of oil visible when the drug was cut. The best samples of this drug as recently imported, have yielded 8 to 10·75 per cent. of morphine, reckoned on the opium in its moist state.[216]

Carles,[217] from a specimen which seems to have been adulterated with sugar, obtained 8·40 per cent. of morphine, and 3·60 of narcotine, the drug not having been previously dried.

Inferior qualities of Persian opium have also been imported. Some that was soft black and extractiform afforded undried only 3 to ½ per cent. of morphine (Howard); while some of very pale hue in small sticks, each wrapped in paper, yielded no more than 0·2 per cent.! (Howard). For further details, [see p. 61].

In Turkestan an aqueous extract of poppy heads collected before maturity is prepared; it seems to be rich in alkaloids.[218]

4. European Opium—From numerous experiments made during the present century in Greece, Italy, France, Switzerland, Germany, England, and even in Sweden, it has been shown that in all these countries a very rich opium, not inferior to that of the East, can be produced.

The most numerous attempts at opium-growing in Europe have been made in France. But although the cultivation was recommended in the strongest terms by Guibourt,[219] who found in French opium the highest percentage of morphine yet observed (22·8 per cent.), it has never become a serious branch of industry.

Aubergier of Clermont-Ferrand has carried on the cultivation with great perseverance since 1844, and has succeeded in producing a very pure inspissated juice which he calls Affium, and which is said to contain uniformly[220] 10 per cent. of morphine. It is made up in cakes of 50 grammes, but is scarcely an article of wholesale commerce.[221]

Some careful and interesting scientific investigations relating to the production of opium in the neighbourhood of Amiens, were made by Decharme in 1855 to 1862.[222] He found 14,725 capsules incised within 6 days to afford 431 grammes of milky juice, yielding 205 grammes (= 47·6 per cent.) of dry opium containing 16 per cent. of morphine. Another sample of dried opium afforded 20 per cent. of morphine. Decharme observed that the amount of morphine diminished when the juice is very slowly dried,—a point of great importance deserving attention in India. The peculiar odour of opium as observable in the oriental drug, is developed, according to the same authority, by a kind of fermentation.[223] Adrian even suggests that morphine is formed only by a similar process, inasmuch as he could obtain none by exhausting fresh poppy capsules with acidulated alcohol, while capsules of the same crop yielded an opium rich in morphine.

5. East Indian Opium—The principal region of British India distinguished for the production of opium is the central tract of the Ganges, comprising an area of about 600 miles in length, by 200 miles in width. It reaches from Dinajpur in the east, to Hazaribagh in the south, and Gorakhpur in the north, and extends westward to Agra, thus including the flat and thickly-populated districts of Behar and Benares. The amount of land here actually under poppy cultivation was estimated in 1871-72 as 560,000 acres.

The region second in importance for the culture of opium consists of the broad table-lands of Malwa, and the slopes of the Vindhya Hills, in the dominions of the Holkar.

Beyond these vast districts, the area under poppy cultivation is comparatively small,[224] yet it appears to be on the increase. Stewart[225] reports (1869) that the plant is grown (principally for opium) throughout the plains of the Punjab, but less commonly in the north-west. In the valley of the Biās, east of Lahore, it is cultivated up to nearly 7500 feet above the sea-level.

The manufacture of opium in these parts of India is not under any restriction as in Hindustan. Most districts, says Powell (1868),[226] cultivate the poppy to a certain extent, and produce a small quantity of indifferent opium for local consumption. The drug, however, is prepared in the Hill States, and the opium of Kūlū (E. of Lahore), is of excellent quality, and forms a staple article of trade in that region. Opium is also produced in Nepal, Basāhīr and Rāmpūr, and at Doda Kashtwar in the Jammū territory.[227] It is exported from these districts to Yarkand, Khutan, Aksu, and other Chinese provinces,—to the extent in 1862 of 210 maunds (= 16,800 lb.). The Madras Presidency exports no opium at all.

The opium districts of Bengal[228] are divided into two agencies, those of Behar and Benares, which are under the control of officials residing respectively at Patna and Ghazipur. The opium is a government monopoly—that is to say, the cultivators are under an obligation to sell their produce to the government at a price agreed on beforehand; at the same time it is wholly optional with them, whether to enter on the cultivation or not.

The variety of poppy cultivated is the same as in Persia, namely, P. somniferum, var. γ album. As in Asia Minor, a moist and fertile soil is indispensable.[229] The plant is liable to injury by insects, excessive rain, hail, or the growth on its roots of a species of Orobanche.

In Behar the sowing takes place at the beginning of November, and the capsules are sacrificed in February or March (March or April in Malwa). This operation is performed with a peculiar instrument, called a nushtur, having three or four two-pointed blades, bound together with cotton thread.[230] In using the nushtur, only one set of points is brought into use at a time, the capsule being scarified vertically from base to summit. This scarification is repeated on different sides of the capsule at intervals of a few days, from two to six times. In many districts of Bengal, transverse cuts are made in the poppy-head as in Asia Minor.

The milky juice is scraped off early on the following morning with an iron scoop, which as it becomes filled is emptied into an earthen pot carried by the collector’s side. In Malwa a flat scraper is used which, as well as the fingers of the gatherer, is wetted from time to time with linseed oil to prevent the adhesion of the glutinous juice. All accounts represent the juice to be in a very moist state by reason of dew, which sometimes even washes it away; but so little is this moisture of the juice thought detrimental that, as Butter states,[231] the collectors in some places actually wash their scrapers in water, and add the washings to the collection of the morning!

The juice when brought home is a wet granular mass of pinkish colour; and in the bottom of the vessel in which it is contained, there collects a dark fluid resembling infusion of coffee, which is called pasēwā. The recent juice strongly reddens litmus, and blackens metallic iron. It is placed in a shallow earthen vessel, which is tilted in such a manner that the pasēwā may drain off as long as there is any of it to be separated. This liquor is set aside in a covered vessel. The residual mass is now exposed to the air, though never to the sun, and turned over every few days to promote its attaining the proper degree of dryness, which according to the Benares regulations, allows of 30 per cent. of moisture. This drying operation occupies three or four weeks.

The drug is then taken to the Government factory for sale; previous to being sold it is examined for adulteration by a native expert, and its proportion of water is also carefully determined. Having been received into stock, it undergoes but little treatment beyond a thorough mixing, until it is required to be formed into globular cakes. This is effected in a somewhat complicated manner, the opium being strictly of standard consistence. First the quantity of opium is weighed out, and having been formed into a ball is enveloped in a crust of dried poppy petals, skilfully agglutinated one over the other by means of a liquid called lēwā. This consists partly of good opium, partly of pasēwā, and partly of opium of inferior quality, all being mixed with the washings of the various pots and vessels which have contained opium, and then evaporated to a thick fluid, 100 grains of which should afford 53 of dry residue. These various things are used to form a ball of opium in the following proportions:—

The finished balls usually termed cakes, which are quite spherical and have a diameter of 6 inches, are rolled in poppy trash which is the name given to the coarsely powdered stalks, capsules and leaves of the plant; they are then placed in small dishes and exposed to the direct influence of the sun. Should any become distended, it is at once opened, the gas allowed to escape, and the cake made up again. After three days the cakes are placed, by the end of July, in frames in the factory where the air is allowed to circulate. They still however require constant watching and turning, as they are liable to contract mildew which has to be removed by rubbing in poppy trash. By October the cakes have become perfectly dry externally and quite hard, and are in condition to be packed in cases (40 cakes in each) for the China market which consumes the great bulk of the manufacture.

For consumption in India the drug is prepared in a different shape. It is inspissated by solar heat till it contains only 10 per cent. of moisture, in which state it is formed into square cages of 2 lb. each which are wrapped in oil paper, or it is made into flat square tablets. Such a drug is known as Abkāri Opium.

The Government opium factories in Bengal are conducted on the most orderly system. The care bestowed in selecting the drug, and in excluding any that is damaged or adulterated is such that the merchants who purchase the commodity rarely require to examine it, although permission is freely accorded to open at each sale any number of chests or cakes they may desire. In the year 1871-72 the number of chests sold was 49,695, the price being £139 per chest, which is £26 higher than the average of the preceding year. The net profit on each chest was £90.[232]

In Malwa the manufacture of opium is left entirely to private enterprise, the profit to Government being derived from an export duty of 600 rupees (£60) per chest.[233] As may readily be supposed, the drug is of much less uniform quality than that which has passed through the Bengal agencies, and having no guarantee as to purity it commands less confidence.

Malwa opium is not made into balls, but into rectangular masses, or bricks which are not cased in poppy petals; it contains as much as 95 per cent. of dry opium. Some opium sold in London as Malwa Opium in 1870 had the form of rounded masses covered with vegetable remains. It was of firm consistence, dark colour, and rather smoky odour. W. D. Howard obtained from it (undried) 9 per cent. of morphine. Other importations afforded the same chemist 4·8 and 6 per cent. respectively.

The chests of Patna opium hold 120 catties or 160 lb. Those of Malwa opium 1 pecul or 133⅓ lb.

The quantity of opium produced in India cannot be ascertained, but the amount exported[234] is accurately known. Thus from British India the exports in the year ending March 31, 1872, were 93,364 chests valued at £13,365,228. Of this quantity Bengal furnished 49,455 chests, Bombay 43,909 chests: they were exported thus:—

The net revenue to the Government of India from opium in the year 1871-72 was £7,657,213.

6. Chinese Opium—China consumes not only nine-tenths of the opium exported from India, and a considerable quantity of that produced in Asia Minor, but the whole of what is raised in her own provinces. How large is this last quantity we shall endeavour to show.

The drug is mentioned as a production of Yunnan in a history of that province, of which the latest edition appeared in 1736. But it is only very recently that its cultivation in China has assumed such large proportions as to threaten serious competition with that in India.[235]

In a Report upon the Trade of Hankow for 1869, addressed to Mr. Hart, Inspector-General of Customs, Pekin, we find Notes of a journey through the opium districts of Szechuen, undertaken for the special purpose of obtaining information about the drug.[236] From these notes it appears that the estimated crop of the province for 1869 was 4235 peculs (= 564,666 lb.). This was considered small, and the Szechuen opium merchants asserted that 6000 peculs was a fair average. The same authorities estimated the annual yield of the province of Kweichow at 15,000, and of Yunnan at 20,000 peculs, making a total of 41,000 peculs or 5,466,666 lb. In 1869 also, Sir R. Alcock reported that about two-thirds of the province of Szechuen and one-third of that of Yunnan were devoted to opium.[237]

Mr. Consul Markham states that the province of Shensi likewise furnishes important supplies. Mr. Edkins the well-known missionary has lately pointed out from personal observation[238] the extensive cultivation of the poppy in the north-eastern province of Shantung.

Opium of very fair quality is now produced about Ninguta (lat. 44°) in north-eastern Manchuria, a region having a rigorous winter climate. Consul Adkins of Newchwang who visited this district in 1871, reports that the opium is inspissated in the sun until hard enough to be wrapped in poppy leaves, and that its price on the spot is equal to about 1s. per ounce.[239]

Shensi opium is said to be the best, then that of Yunnan. But Chinese consumers mostly regard home-grown opium as inferior in strength and flavour, and only fit for use when mixed with the Indian drug.[240]

It must not be supposed that the growing of opium in China has passed unnoticed by the Chinese Government. Whatever may be the nature of the sanction now accorded to this branch of industry, it was “rigorously” prohibited, at least in some provinces, about ten years ago, the effect of the prohibition being to stimulate the foreign importations. Thus at Shanghai in 1865, the importation of Benares opium was 2637 peculs,[241] being more than double that of the previous year, and Persian opium, very rarely seen before, was imported to the extent of 533 peculs, besides about 70 peculs of Turkish.[242]

Of the growth of the trade in opium between India and China, the following figures[243] will give some idea: value of exports in

In 1877 the imports of opium in Hong Kong were stated to consist of 6818 peculs, valued at 2,380,665 taels, coming from Patna (2158 peculs), Benares (3596 peculs), Persia (1041 peculs), Malwa (10 peculs), Turkey (3⅓ peculs). In the same year 4043 peculs of opium were imported in Amoy.

Poppy cultivation in the south-west of China has been briefly described by Thorel,[245] from whose remarks it would appear to be exactly like that of India. The poppy is white-flowered; the head is wounded with a three-bladed knife, in a series of 3 to 5 vertical incisions, and the exuded juice is scraped off and transferred to a small pot suspended at the waist. How the drug is finished off we know not. A Chinese account states simply that the best opium is sun-dried. But little is known of its physical and chemical properties. Thorel speaks of it as a soft substance resembling an extract. Dr. R. A. Jamieson[246] describes a sample submitted to him as a flat cake enveloped in the sheathing petiole of bamboo; externally it was a blackish-brown, glutinous substance, dry and brittle on the outside. It lost by drying 18 per cent. of water, and afforded upon incineration 7·5 per cent. of ash. In 100 grains of the (undried) drug, there were found 5·9 of morphine, and 7·5 of narcotine. ([See also p. 62].)

The Chinese who prepare opium for use by converting it into an aqueous extract which they smoke, do not estimate the value of the drug according to its richness in morphine, but by peculiarities of aroma and degree of solubility. In China the preparation of opium for smoking is a special business, not beneath the notice even of Europeans.[247]

7. Zambezi or Mozambik Opium—From a notice in Pharm. Journal viii. (1878) 1007, it would appear that the Portuguese have formed in 1877 a large company called the “Mozambique Opium Cultivating and Trading Company.”

Description—The leading characteristics of each kind of opium have been already noticed. The following remarks bear chiefly on the microscopic appearances of the drug.

As will be presently shown, a more or less considerable part of the drug consists of peculiar substances which are mostly crystallizable and are many of them present in a crystalline state in the drug itself. All kinds of opium appear more or less crystalline when a little in a dry state is triturated with benzol and examined under the microscope. The forms are various: opium from Asia Minor exhibits needles and short imperfect crystals usually not in large quantity, whereas Indian and still more Persian opium is not only highly crystalline but shows a variety of forms which become beautifully evident when seen by polarized light. In several kinds large crystals occur which are doubtless sugar, either intentionally mixed or naturally present. The crystals seen in opium are not however sufficiently developed to warrant positive conclusions as to their nature, besides which the opium constituents when pure are capable under slightly varied circumstances of assuming very different forms. Hence the attempt to obtain from solutions crystals which shall be comparable with those of the same substances in a state of purity often fails. Some interesting observations in this direction were made by Deane and Brady in 1864-5.[248]

All opium has a peculiar narcotic odour and a sharp bitter taste.

Chemical Composition—Poppy-juice like analogous vegetable fluids is a mixture of several substances in variable proportion. With the commoner substances which constitute the great bulk of the drug we are not yet sufficiently acquainted.

In the first place (independently of water) there is found mucilage distinct from that of gum arabic, also pectic matter,[249] and albumin. These bodies, together with unavoidable fragments of the poppy capsules, probably amount on an average to more than half the weight of the opium.[250]

In addition to these substances, the juice also contains sugar in solution,—in French opium to the extent of 6½ to 8 per cent.: according to Decharme it is uncrystallizable. Sugar also exists in other opium, but whether always naturally has not been determined.

Fresh poppy-juice contains in the form of emulsion, wax, pectin, albumin and insoluble calcareous salts. When good Turkey opium is treated with water these substances remain in the residue to the extent of 6 to 10 per cent.

Hesse (1870) has isolated the wax by exhausting the refuse of opium with boiling alcohol and a little lime. He thus obtained a crystalline mass from which he separated by chloroform Palmitate and Cerotate of Cerotyl, the former in the larger proportion.

The presence of Caoutchouc has also been pointed out; Procter[251] found opium produced in Vermont to contain about 11 per cent. of that substance, together with a little fatty matter and resin.

Respecting the colouring matter and an extremely small quantity of a volatile body with pepper-like odour, we know but little. After the colouring matter has been precipitated from an aqueous solution of opium by lead acetate, the liquid becomes again coloured by exposure to the air. As to the volatile body, it may be removed by acetone or benzol, but has not yet been isolated.

The salts of inorganic bases, chiefly of calcium, magnesium and potassium, contain partly the ordinary acids such as phosphoric and sulphuric, and partly an acid peculiar to the poppy.

Good opium of Asia Minor dried at 100° C. yields 4 to 8 per cent. of ash.

Poppy-juice contains neither starch nor tannic acid, the absence of which easily detected substances affords one criterion for judging of the purity of the drug.

The proportion of water in opium is very variable. In drying Turkey opium previous to pulverization and for other pharmaceutical purposes, the average loss is about 12½ per cent.[252] Bengal opium, which resembles a soft black extract, is manufactured so as to contain 30 per cent. of water.

As the active constituents of opium, or at all events the morphine, can be completely extracted by cold water, the proportion of soluble matter is of practical importance. In good opium of Asia Minor previously dried, the extract (dried at 100° C.) always amounts to between 55 and 66 per cent.,—generally to more than 60, thus affording in many instances a test of the pureness of the drug. Dried Indian opium yields from 60 to 68 per cent. of matter soluble in cold water.[253]

The peculiar constituents of opium are of basic, acid, or neutral nature. Some of these substances were observed in opium as early as the 17th and 18th century, and designated Magisterium Opii. Bucholz in 1802 vainly endeavoured to obtain a salt from the extract by crystallization. In 1803, however, Charles Derosne, an apothecary of Paris, in diluting a syrupy aqueous extract of opium, observed crystals of the substance now called Narcotine, which he prepared pure. He believed that the same body was obtained by precipitating the mother liquor with an alkali, but what he so got was morphine. It is needless to pursue the further researches of Derosne. Ingenious as they were, it was reserved for Friedrich Wilhelm Adam Sertürner, apothecary of Einbeck in Hanover (nat. 1783, ob. 1841) to discover their true interpretation.

Sertürner had been engaged since 1805 with the chemical investigation of opium, and in 1816 he summarized his results in the statement that he had enriched science (we now translate his own words[254])—“not only with the knowledge of a remarkable new vegetable acid [Mekonsäure (meconic acid) which he had made known as Opiumsäure in 1806], but also with the discovery of a new alkaline salifiable base, Morphium, one of the most remarkable substances, and apparently related to ammonia.” Sertürner in fact distinctly recognised the basic nature and the organic constitution of morphium (now called Morphine, Morphia, or Morphinum), and prepared a number of its crystalline salts. He likewise demonstrated the poisonous nature of these substances by experiments on himself and others. Lastly, he pointed out, though very incorrectly, the difference between morphine and the so-called Opium-salt (Narcotine) of Derosne. It is possible that this latter chemist may have had morphine in his hands at the same time as Sertürner, or even earlier. This honour is also due to Séguin, whose paper “Sur l’Opium” read at the Institute, December 24, 1804, was, strange to say, not published till 1814.[255] To Sertürner, however, undoubtedly belongs the merit of first making known the existence of organic alkalis in the vegetable kingdom,[256]—a series of bodies practically interminable. As to opium, it still remains after nearly seventy years a nidus of new substances.

Solutions of morphine in acids or in alkalis rotate the plane of polarization to the left.

The morphine in opium is combined with meconic acid, and is therefore easily soluble in water.[257] The Narcotine is present in the free state, and can be extracted by chloroform, boiling alcohol, benzol, ether, or volatile oils,[258] but not by water. It dissolves in 3 parts of chloroform, in 20 of boiling alcohol, in 21 of benzol, in 40 of boiling ether. Its alkaline properties are very weak, and it does not affect vegetable colours. If we examine opium by the microscope we cannot at once detect the presence of narcotine, but if first moistened with glycerin, numerous large crystals may generally be found after the lapse of some days. If the opium has been previously exhausted with benzol or ether, in order to remove the narcotine, no such crystals will be formed. Hence it follows that narcotine pre-exists in an amorphous state.

By decomposition with sulphuric acid, narcotine yields Cotarnine, an undoubted base, together with Opianic Acid, and certain derivatives of the latter.

The discovery of another base, Codeine, was made in 1832 by Robiquet. It dissolves in 17 parts of boiling water, forming a highly alkaline solution which perfectly saturates acids, and exhibits in polarized light a levogyre power. Codeine is also readily soluble at ordinary temperatures in 7 parts amylic alcohol, and in 11 of benzol.

The codeine of commerce is in very large crystals containing 2 atoms = 5·66 per cent. of water. By crystallization from ether the alkaloid may be obtained in small anhydrous crystals.

Since 1832 other alkaloids have been found in opium, as may be seen in the following table, which includes all the 17 now known.[259]

A very large number of derivatives of several among them have been prepared, of which we point out a few in smaller type. The molecular constitution of these opium alkaloids being not yet thoroughly settled, we add only their empirical formulæ, which however exhibit unmistakeable connections.

Papaverosine discovered by Deschamps in poppy heads ([p. 42]) can hardly be absent from opium. In some points it appears to resemble cryptopine.

Among the peculiar non-basic constituents of opium, the first to call for notice is Meconic Acid, C₇H₄O₇, discovered, as already observed, by Sertürner in 1805. It is distinguished by the red colour which it produces with ferric salts, the same as that of ferric sulphocyanate; but the latter only dissolves in ether. Meconic acid is soluble in 4 parts of boiling water, but immediately gives off CO₂, and the remaining solution instead of depositing micaceous crystalline scales of meconic acid, yields on cooling (but best after boiling with hydrochloric acid) hard granular crystals of Comenic Acid, C₆H₄O₅.

Lactic Acid was discovered by T. and H. Smith in the opium-liquors produced in the manufacture of morphine. These chemists regarded it as a peculiar body, and under the name of Thebolactic Acid, exhibited it together with its copper and morphine salts at the London International Exhibition of 1862. Its identity with ordinary lactic acid was ascertained by Stenhouse (whose experiments have not been published) and also by J. Y. Buchanan.[260] T. and H. Smith consider it to be a regular constituent of Turkey opium; they obtained it as a calcium salt to the amount of about 2 per cent., and have prepared it in this form and in a pure state to the extent of over 100 lb. In our opinion it is not an original constituent of poppy-juice.

NATURAL ALKALOIDS OF OPIUM

and a few of their Artificial Derivatives.

In the year 1826, Dublanc[261] observed in opium a peculiar substance having neither basic nor acid properties which was afterwards (1832) prepared in a state of purity by Couerbe. It has been called Opianyl or (by Couerbe) Meconine. It has the composition C₁₀H₁₀O₄ = C₆H₂·CH₂·O·CO(OCH₃)₂. Meconin forms prisms which fuse under water at 77° C. or per se at 110°, and distil at 155°; it dissolves in about 20 parts of boiling water, from which it may be readily crystallized. Meconin may be formed by heating narcotine with nitric acid.

An analogous substance Meconoiosin C₈H₁₀O₂ = C₆H₂·(OH)₂·(CH₃)₂, has been discovered in 1878 by T. and H. Smith. Meconoiosin is readily soluble in 27 parts of cold water, and melts at 88° C. When heated with slightly diluted sulphuric acid, and when the evaporation has reached a certain point, meconoiosin produces a deep red; with meconin the coloration is a beautiful green.

Proportion of peculiar constituents—The substances described in the foregoing section exist in opium in very variable proportion; and as it is on their presence, but especially that of morphine, that the value of the drug depends, the importance of exact estimation is evident.

Opium whether required for analysis or for pharmaceutical preparations has to be taken exclusively in the dry state. The amount of water it contains is so uncertain that the drug must be reduced to a fixed standard by complete desiccation at 100° C., before any given weight is taken.

Morphine—Guibourt[262] who analysed a large number of samples of opium, and whose skill and care in such research are not disputed, obtained from a sample of French opium produced near Amiens, 22·88 per cent. of morphine crystallized from spirit of wine. This percentage has not to our knowledge been ever exceeded. From another specimen produced in the same district he got 21·23 per cent., from a third 20·67. The lowest percentage from a French opium was 14·96,—in each case reckoned on material previously dried.

Chevallier extracted from opium grown by Aubergier at Clermont in the centre of France, 17·50 per cent. of morphine. Decharmes from a French opium obtained 17·6 per cent., and Biltz from a German opium 20 per cent. Opium produced in Württemberg sent to the Vienna Exhibition of 1873 afforded Hesse 12 to 15 per cent. of morphine; and opium from Silesia 9 to 10 per cent.[263]

A pure American opium collected in the State of Vermont yielded Proctor 15·75 per cent. of morphine and 2 percent of narcotine.[264]

The opium of Asia Minor furnishes very nearly the same proportions of morphine as that of Europe. The maximum recorded by Guibourt is 21·46 per cent. obtained from a Smyrna opium sold in Paris. The mean yield of 8 samples of opium sent by Della Sudda of Constantinople to the Paris Exhibition of 1855 was 14·78 per cent. The mean percentage of morphine afforded by 12 other samples of Turkey opium obtained from various sources was 14·66.

Chevallier[265] states that Smyrna opium, of which several cases were received by Merck of Darmstadt in 1845, afforded 12 to 13 per cent. of pure morphine reckoned upon the drug in its fresh and moist state.

Fayk Bey[266] analysed 92 samples of opium of Asia Minor, and found that half the number yielded more than 10 per cent. of morphine. The richest afforded 17·2 per cent.

From the foregoing statements we are warranted in assuming that good Smyrna opium deprived of water ought to afford 12 to 15 per cent. of morphine, and that if the percentage is less than 10, adulteration may be suspected.

Egyptian opium has usually been found very much weaker in morphine than that of Asia Minor. A sample sent to the Paris Exhibition of 1865 and presented to one of us by Figari Bey of Cairo, afforded us 5·8 per cent. of morphine and 8·7 of narcotine.

Persian opium appears extremely variable, probably in consequence of the practice of combining it with sugar and other substances. It is however sometimes very good. Séput[267] obtained from four samples the respective percentages of 13·47, 11·52, 10·12, 10·08 of morphine, the opium being free from water. Mr. Howard as already stated ([p. 49]) extracted from Persian opium, not previously dried, from 8 to 10·75 per cent. of morphine.

East Indian opium is remarkable for its low percentage of morphine, a circumstance which we think is attributable in part to climate and in part to a method of collection radically defective. It is scarcely conceivable that the long period during which the juice remains in a wet state,—always three to four weeks,—does not exercise a destructive action on its constituents.

According to Eatwell[268] the percentage of morphine in the samples of Benares opium officially submitted for analysis gave the following averages.—

The same observer has recorded the results of the examination of freshly collected poppy-juice, which in three instances afforded respectively 1·4, 3·06, and 2·89 per cent. of morphine, reckoned on the material deprived of water; but the conditions under which the experiments were made appear open to great objection.[269]

Such very low results are not always obtained from East Indian opium. In a sample from Khandesh furnished by the Indian Museum, we found 6·07 of morphine. Solly from the same kind obtained about 7 per cent.

Patna Garden Opium which is the sort prepared exclusively for medicinal use, afforded us 8·6 per cent. of purified morphine and 4 per cent. of narcotine.[270] Guibourt obtained from such an opium 7·72 per cent. Christison from a sample sent to Duncan of Edinburgh in 1830,[271] 9·50 per cent. of hydrochlorate of morphine.

Samples from the Indian Museum placed at our disposal by Dr. J. Forbes Watson gave[272] us the following percentages of morphine:—Medical (Indian) Opium, 1852-53, portion of a square brick, 4·3; Garden Behar Opium, 4·6; Abkāri Provision Opium, Patna, No. 5380, 3·5; Sind Opium, No. 28, 3·8; Opium, Hyderabad, Sind, 3·2 (and 5·4 of narcotine); Malwa Opium, 6·1.

With regard to the percentage of morphine in Chinese Opium, the following data have been obligingly furnished to us by Mr. T. W. Sheppard, F.C.S., Opium Examiner to the Benares Opium Agency, of analyses made by himself from samples of the drug procured in China by Sir R. Alcock:—Szechuen opium, 2·2; Kweichow, 2·5; Yunnan, 4·1; Kansu, 5·1 per cent. Mr. S. informs us that Dr. Eatwell obtained in 1852 from Szechuen opium 3·3, and from Kweichow opium 6·1[273] per cent.—the opium in all instances being reckoned as dry. The samples examined by Mr. S. contained 86 to 95 per cent. of dry opium, and yielded (undried) 36 to 53 per cent. of extract soluble in cold water. The proportion of morphine in the sample of Chinese opium analysed by Dr. Jamieson ([p. 55]) was nearly 7·2 per cent. calculated on the dry drug.

Pseudomorphine—occurs only in very small quantities. Hesse found it in some sorts of opium to the extent of 0·02 per cent.—in others still less.

Codeine—has been found in Smyrna, French and Indian opium, but only to the extent of ⅕ to ⅖ per cent. T. and H. Smith give the proportion in Turkey opium as 0·3 per cent.[274]

Thebaine—which has likewise been obtained from French opium, amounts in Turkey opium according to Merck to about 1 per cent. In the latter sort T. and H. Smith found only about 8·15 per cent., but of

Papaverine—in the same drug, 1 per cent.

Narcotine—exists in opium in widely different proportions and often in considerable abundance. Thus Schindler obtained in 1834 from a Smyrna opium yielding 10·30 per cent. of morphine, 1·30 per cent. of narcotine. Biltz (1831) analysed an oriental opium which afforded 9·25 per cent. of morphine and 7·50 of narcotine. Reveil (1860) obtained from Persian opium not rich in morphine, from half as much to twice as much narcotine as morphine. The utmost of narcotine was 9·90 per cent. We have found in German opium of undubitable purity[275] 10·9 per cent. of narcotine.

East Indian opium was found by Eatwell (1850) always to afford more narcotine than morphine,—frequently twice as much. The sample from Khandesh referred to on the opposite page, afforded us 7·7 per cent. of pure narcotine.

French opium collected from the Pavot œillette sometimes affords neither narcotine, thebaine, nor narceine.[276]

Narceine—Of this substance Couerbe found in opium 0·1 per cent.; T. and H. Smith 0·02 and Schindler 0·71.

Cryptopine—exists in opium in very small proportion. T. and H. Smith state that since the alkaloid first came under their notice, they have collected of it altogether about 5 ounces in the form of hydrochlorate, and this small quantity in operating on many thousands of pounds of opium. But they by no means assert that the whole of the cryptopine was obtained.

Rhœadine—is also found only in exceedingly minute quantity.

Meconic Acid—If the average amount of morphine in opium be estimated at 15 per cent., and the alkaloid be supposed to exist as a tribasic meconate, it would require for saturation 3·4 per cent. of meconic acid. Wittstein obtained rather more than 3 per cent., T. and H. Smith 4 per cent., and Decharmes 4·33. Opium produced in Vermont yielded, according to Proctor (1870) 5·25 per cent. of meconic acid. The quantity of acid required to unite with the other bases assuming them to exist as salts can be but extremely small.

Estimation of Morphine in Opium—The practical valuation of opium turns in the first instance upon the estimation of the water present in the drug, and in the second upon the proportion which the latter contains of morphine.[277]

The first question is determined by exposing a known quantity of the drug divided into small slices or fragments to the heat of a water-bath until it cease to lose weight.

For the estimation of the morphine many processes have been devised, but none is perfectly satisfactory.[278] That which we recommend is thus performed:—Take of opium previously dried at 100° C., as above stated, and powdered, 10 grammes; shake it with 100 grammes alcohol 0·950 sp. gr., and filter after a day or two. The weight of the liquid should be made equal to 100 grammes. Add to it 50 grammes of ether and 2 grammes of ammonia water 0·960 sp. gr.; collect the crystals of opium which separate slowly, after a day or two, dry them at 100° C., and weigh them.—On applying this method to Indian opium, we were but little satisfied with it.

Commerce—By official statistics it appears that the quantity of opium imported into the United Kingdom in 1872 was 356,211 lb., valued at £361,503. The imports from Asiatic and European Turkey are stated in the same tables thus:—

It is thus evident that the drug used in Great Britain is chiefly Turkish. The import of opium from Persia has been very irregular. In 1871, 21,894 lb. are reported as received from that country; in 1872, none.

Except that a little Malwa opium has occasionally been imported, it may be asserted the opium of India is entirely unknown in the English market, and that none of it is to be found even in London in the warehouse of any druggist.

As to other countries, we may point out that in 1876 the import of opium (prepared) into the colony of Victoria was valued at £104,557.

Uses—Opium possesses sedative powers which are universally known. In the words of Pereira, it is the most important and valuable medicine of the whole Materia Medica; and we may add, the source by its judicious employment of more happiness and by its abuse of more misery[279] than any other drug employed by mankind.

Adulteration—The manifold falsifications of opium have been already noticed, and the method by which its more important alkaloid may be estimated has been pointed out. Moreover as already stated, neither tannic acid nor starch ever occur in genuine opium; and the proportion of ash left upon the incineration of a good opium does not exceed 4 to 8 per cent. of the dried drug. Another criterion is afforded by the amount soluble in cold water which ought to exceed 55 per cent. reckoned on dry opium. Finally, if we are correct, the gum contained in pure opium is distinct from gum arabic, being precipitable by neutral acetate of lead. If we exhaust with water opium falsified with gum arabic, the mucilage peculiar to opium will be precipitated by neutral acetate of lead, the liquid separated from the precipitate will still contain the gum arabic which may be thrown down by alcohol. If gum is present to some extent, an abundant precipitate is produced.

CRUCIFERÆ.

SEMEN SINAPIS NIGRÆ.

Black, Brown or Red Mustard; F. Moutarde noire ou grise; G. Schwarzer Senf.

Botanical Origin—Brassica nigra Koch (Sinapis nigra L.). Black Mustard is found wild over the whole of Europe excepting the extreme north. It also occurs in Northern Africa, Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, the Caucasian region, Western India, as well as in Southern Siberia and China. By cultivation, which is conducted on a large scale in many countries (as Alsace, Bohemia, Holland, England and Italy), it has doubtless been diffused through regions where it did not anciently exist. It has now become naturalized both in North and South America.

History—Mustard was well known to the ancients. Theophrastus mentions it as Νάπμ,—Dioscorides as Νάπμ or Σίνηπι. Pliny notices three kinds which have been referred by Fée[280] to Brassica nigra Koch, B. alba Hook. f. et Th., and to a South European species, Diplotaxis erucoides DC. (Sinapis erucoides L.). The use of mustard seems up to this period to have been more medicinal than dietetic. But from an edict of Diocletian, a.d. 301[281] in which it is mentioned along with alimentary substances, we must suppose it was then regarded as a condiment at least in the eastern parts of the Roman Empire.

In Europe during the middle ages mustard was a valued accompaniment to food, especially to the salted meat which constituted a large portion of the diet of our ancestors during the winter.[282] In the Welsh “Meddygon Myddvai,” of the 13th century, a paragraph is devoted to the “Virtues of Mustard.” In household accounts of the 13th and 14th centuries, mustard under the name of Senapium is of constant occurrence.

Mustard was then cultivated in England, but not as it would seem very extensively. The price of the seed between a.d. 1285 and 1395 varied from 1s. 3d. to 6s. 8d. per quarter, but in 1347 and 1376 it was as high as 15s. and 16s.[283] In the accounts of the abbey of St. Germain-des-Prés in Paris, commencing a.d. 800, mustard is specifically mentioned as a regular part of the revenue of the convent lands.[284]

The essential oil of mustard was, apparently, noticed about the year 1660 by Nicolas Le Febvre (see in the article Rad. Inulae), more distinctly in 1732 by Boerhaave. Its acridity and high specific gravity were pointed out by Murray.[285] Thibierge in 1819 observed that sulphur was one of the constituents of the oil, and Guibourt[286] stated that it is not pre-existing in the seed.

Production—Mustard is grown in England only on the richest alluvial soils, and chiefly in the counties of Lincolnshire and Yorkshire. Very good seed is produced in Holland.

Description—The pod of Brassica nigra is smooth, erect, and closely pressed against the axis of the long slender raceme. It has a strong nerve on each of its two valves and contains in each cell from 4 to 6 spherical or slightly oval seeds. The seeds are about ¹/₂₅ of an inch in diameter and ¹/₅₀ of a grain in weight; they are of a dark reddish-brown. The surface is reticulated with minute pits, and often more or less covered with a whitish pellicle which gives to some seeds a grey colour.[287] The testa which is thin, brittle and translucent encloses an exalbuminous embryo having two short cotyledons folded together longitudinally and forming a sort of trough in which the radicle lies bent up. The embryo thus coiled into a ball completely fills the testa; the outer cotyledon is thicker than the inner, which viewed in transverse section seems to hold the radicle as a pair of forceps. The seeds when pulverized have a greenish yellow hue. Masticated they have for an instant a bitterish taste which however quickly becomes pungent. When triturated with water they afford a yellowish emulsion emitting a pungent acrid vapour which affects the eyes, and has a strong acid reaction. The seeds powdered dry have no such pungency. When the seeds are triturated with solution of potash, the pungent odour is not evolved; nor when they are boiled in water. Neither is the acridity developed on triturating them with alcohol, dilute mineral acids, or solution of tannin, or even with water when they have been kept in powder for a long time.

Microscopic Structure—The whitish pellicle already mentioned, which covers the seed, is made up of hexagonal tabular cells. The epidermis consists of one row of densely packed brown cells, radially elongated and having strong lateral and inner walls. Their outer walls on the other hand are thin and not coloured; they are not clearly obvious when seen under oil, but swell up very considerably in presence of water, emitting mucilage.[288] Seeds immersed in water become therefore covered with a glossy envelope, levelling down the superficial inequalities, so that the wet seed appears smooth. The tissue of the cotyledons exhibits large drops of fatty oil and granules of albumin.

Chemical Composition—By distilling brown mustard with water, the seed having been previously macerated, the pungent principle, Essential Oil of Mustard, is obtained.

The oil, which has the composition SCN(C₃H⁵), (allyl isosulphocyanate), boils at 148° C.; it has a sp. gr. of 1·017, no rotatory power, and is soluble without coloration or turbidity in three times its weight or more of cold strong sulphuric acid. To this oil is due the pungent smell and taste of mustard and its inflammatory action on the skin. As already pointed out, mustard oil is not present in the dry seeds, but is produced only after they have been comminuted and mixed with water, the temperature of which should not exceed 50° C.

The remarkable reaction which gives rise to the formation of mustard oil was explained by Will and Körner in 1863. They obtained from mustard a crystallizable substance, then termed Myronate of potassium, now called Sinigrin. It is to be regarded, according to the admirable investigations of these chemists, as a compound of

is that of sinigrin. It does in fact split into the above-mentioned three substances when dissolved in water and brought into contact with Myrosin.

This albuminous body discovered by Bussy in 1839, but the composition of which has not been made out, likewise undergoes a certain decomposition under these circumstances. Sinigrin may likewise be decomposed by alkalis and, according to Ludwig and Lange, by silver nitrate. These chemists obtained sinigrin from the seeds in the proportion of 0·5 per cent.; Will and Körner got 0·5 to 0·6 per cent. The extraction of the substance is therefore attended with great loss, as the minimum yield of volatile oil, 0·42 per cent. indicates 2·36 of potassium myronate.

The aqueous solution of myrosin coagulates at 60° C. and then becomes inactive: hence mustard seed which has been heated to 100° C. or has been roasted yields no volatile oil, nor does it yield any if powdered and introduced at once into boiling water. The proportion of myrosin in mustard has not been exactly determined. The total amount of nitrogen in the seed is 2·9 per cent. (Hoffmann) which would correspond to 18 per cent. of myrosin, supposing the proportion of nitrogen in that substance to be the same as in albumin, and the total quantity of nitrogen to belong to it. Sometimes black mustard contains so little of it, that an emulsion of white mustard requires to be added in order to develop all the volatile oil it is capable of yielding.

An emulsion of mustard or a solution of pure sinigrin brought into contact with myrosin, frequently deposits sulphur by decomposition of the allyl sulphocyanide, hence crude oil of mustard sometimes contains a considerable proportion (even half) of Allyl cyanide, C₄H₅N, distinguished by its lower sp. gr. (0·839) and lower boiling point (118° C.).

The seeds, roots, or herbaceous part of many other plants of the order Cruciferæ yield a volatile oil composed in part of mustard oil and in part of allyl sulphide

C₆H₁₀S =	C₂H₅		S,
	C₃H₅

which latter is likewise obtainable from the bulbs of garlic. Many Cruciferæ afford from their roots or seeds chiefly or solely oil of mustard, and from their leaves oil of garlic. As to other plants, the roots of Reseda lutea L. and R. luteola L. have been shown by Volhard (1871) to afford oil of mustard.[289] The strong smell given off by the crushed seeds or roots of several Mimoseæ, as for instance, Albizzia lophantha Benth. (Acacia Willd.) is perhaps due to some allied compound.

The artificial preparation of mustard oil was discovered in 1855 by Zinin, and at the same time also by Berthelot and De Luca. It may be obtained in decomposing bromide of allyl by means of sulphocyanate of ammonium:—

C₃H₅Br · SCN(NH₄) = NH₄Br · C₃H₅SCN.

The liquid C₃H₅SCN, boiling at 161°, is sulphocyanate of allyl; if it is gently warmed with a little alcoholic potash, and then acidulated, the red coloration of ferric sulphocyanate is produced on addition of perchloride of iron, but by submitting the sulphocyanate of allyl to distillation it is at once transformed in the isosulphocyanate, i.e. in mustard oil; the latter is not coloured by ferric salts, but it would appear that in the cold emulsion of mustard, even at 0°, a little sulphocyanate makes also its appearance.

Mustard submitted to pressure affords about 23 per cent.[290] of a mild-tasting, inodorous, non-drying oil, solidifying when cooled to -17·5° C., and consisting of the glycerin compounds of stearic, oleic and Erucic or Brassic Acid. The last named acid, C₂₂H₄₂O₂, occurs also in the fixed oil of white mustard and of rape, and is homologous with oleic acid. Darby (1849) has pointed out the existence of another body, Sinapoleic Acid, C₂₀H₃⁸O₂, which occurs in the fixed oil of both black and white mustard. Goldschmiedt, in 1874, ascertained the presence also of Behenic Acid, C₂₂H₄₄O₂ in black mustard. Sinigrin being not altered by the extraction of the fatty oil, either by pressure or by means of bisulphide of carbon, the powdered seed, deprived of fatty oil, still yields the whole amount of the irritating “essential” oil. This important fact has been ingeniously used by Rigollot[291] for the preparation of his mustard paper.

Mustard seed when ripe is devoid of starch; the mucilage which its epidermis affords amounts to 19 per cent. of the seed (Hoffmann). The ash constituents amounting to 4 per cent. consist chiefly of the phosphates of calcium, magnesium, and potassium.

Uses—Black mustard is employed in the form of poultice as a powerful external stimulant; but it is rarely used in its pure state, as the Flour of Mustard prepared for the table, which contains in addition white mustard, answers perfectly well and is at hand in every house.[292]

The essential oil of mustard dissolved in spirit of wine is occasionally prescribed as a liniment.

Substitute—Brassica juncea Hook. f. et Th. (Sinapis juncea L.) is extensively cultivated throughout India (where B. nigra is rarely grown), Central Africa, and generally in warm countries where it replaces B. nigra and is applied to the same uses. Its seeds constitute a portion of the mustard of Europe, as we may infer from the fact that British India exported in the year 1871-72, of “Mustard seed” 1418 tons, of which 790 tons were shipped to the United Kingdom, and 516 tons to France.[293] B. juncea is largely grown in the south of Russia and in the steppes north-east of the Caspian where it appears to flourish particularly well in the saline soil. At Sarepta in the Government of Saratov, an establishment has existed since the beginning of the present century where this sort of mustard is prepared for use to the extent of 800 tons of seed annually. The seeds make a fine yellow powder employed both for culinary and medicinal purposes. By pressure they yield more than 20 per cent. of fixed oil which is used in Russia like the best olive oil. The seeds closely resemble those of B. nigra and afford when distilled the same essential oil; it is largely made at Kiew.

SEMEN SINAPIS ALBÆ.

White Mustard; F. Moutarde blanche ou Anglaise; G. Weisser Senf.

Botanical Origin—Brassica alba Hook. f. et Th. (Sinapis alba L.) This plant appears to belong to the more southern countries of Europe and Western Asia. According to Chinese authors[294] it was introduced into China from the latter region. Its cultivation in England is of recent introduction, but is rapidly extending.[295] The plant is not uncommon as a weed on cultivated land.

History—White mustard was used in former times indiscriminately with the brown. In the materia medica of the London Pharmacopœia of 1720 the two sorts are separately prescribed. The important chemical distinction between them was first made known in 1831 by Boutron-Charlard and Robiquet.[296]

Production—White mustard is grown as an agricultural crop in Essex and Cambridgeshire.

Description—Brassica alba differs from B. nigra in having the pods bristly and spreading. They are about an inch long, half the length being occupied by a flat veiny beak. Each pod contains 4 to 6 yellowish seeds about ¹/₁₂ of an inch in diameter and ⅒ of a grain in weight. The brittle, nearly transparent and colourless testa encloses an embryo of a bright pure yellow and of the same structure as that of black mustard. The surface of the testa is likewise pitted in a reticulate manner, but so finely that it appears smooth except under a high magnifying power.

When triturated with water the seeds form a yellowish emulsion of very pungent taste, but it is inodorous and does not under any circumstances yield a volatile oil. The powdered seeds made into a paste with cold water act as a highly stimulating cataplasm. The entire seeds yield to cold water an abundance of mucilage.

Microscopic Structure—The epidermal cells of white mustard afford a good illustration of a mucilage-yielding layer such as is met with, under many variations, in the seeds of numerous plants. The cuticle consists of large vaulted cells, exhibiting very regular hexagonal outlines when cut across.[297] The inner layer of the epidermis is made up of thin-walled cells, which when moistened swell and give off the mucilage. In the dry state or seen under oil, the outlines of the single cells of this layer are not distinguishable. The tissue of the cotyledons is loaded with drops of fatty oil and with granular albuminoid matter; starch which is present in the seed while young, is altogether absent when the latter reaches maturity.

Chemical Composition—White mustard deprived of fatty oil yields to boiling alcohol colourless crystals of Sinalbin, an indifferent substance, readily soluble in cold water, but sparingly in cold alcohol. From the able investigations of Will (1870) it follows, that it is to be regarded as composed of three bodies, namely:

represents according to Will the composition of sinalbin. It is actually resolved into these three substances when placed at ordinary temperatures, in contact with water and Myrosin, the latter of which is a constituent of white mustard as well as of brown ([p. 66]). The liquid becomes turbid, the first of the above-named substances separates (together with coagulated albumin) as an oily liquid, not soluble in water, but dissolving in alcohol or ether. This Sulphocyanate of Acrinyl is the rubefacient and vesicating principle of white mustard. It does not pre-exist, as shown by Will, in the seed, and cannot be obtained by distillation. By treating it with a salt of silver, Will obtained crystals of cyanide of acrinyl, C₈H₇NO: by warming it (or sinalbin itself, or an alcoholic extract of the seed) with caustic potash, sulphocyanide of potassium is produced. The presence of the latter may be indicated by adding a drop of perchloride of iron, when a blood-red coloration will be produced.[298]

Sulphate of Sinapine imparts to the emulsion of white mustard, in which it is formed, an acid reaction. Sinapine is itself an alkaloid, which has not yet been isolated, as it is very liable to change. Thus its solution on addition of a trace of alkali immediately assumes a bright yellow colour indicating decomposition, and a similar colour is produced in an aqueous extract of the seed.

The above statements show, that the chemical properties of sinalbin and its derivatives correspond closely with those of sinigrin ([p. 66]) and the substances which make their appearance in an emulsion of black mustard.

The other constituents of white mustard seed are nearly the same as those of black. The fat oil appears to yield in addition to the acids mentioned at [p. 67], Benic or Behenic Acid, C₂₂H₄₄O₂. White mustard is said to be richer than black in myrosin, so that, as explained in the previous article, the pungency of the latter may be often increased by an addition of white mustard. By burning white mustard dried at 100° C., with soda-lime, we obtained from 4·20 to 4·30 per cent. of nitrogen, answering to about 28 per cent. of protein substances.[299] The fixed oil of the seed amounts to 22 per cent. The mucilage as yielded by the epidermis is precipitable by alcohol, neutral lead acetate, or ferric chloride, and is soluble in water after drying.

Erucin and Sinapic Acid, mentioned by Simon (1838)[300] as peculiar constituents of white mustard, are altogether doubtful, yet may deserve further investigation. The sinapic acid of Von Babo and Hirschbrunn[301] (1852) is a product of the decomposition of sinapine.

Uses—White Mustard seed reduced to powder and made into a paste with cold water act as a powerful stimulant when applied to the skin, notwithstanding that such paste is entirely wanting in essential oil. But for sinapisms they are actually used only in the form of the Flour of Mustard which is prepared for the table and which contains also Brown Mustard seed.

RADIX ARMORACIÆ.

Horse-radish; F. Raifort (i.e. racine forte), Cran de Bretagne; G. Meerrettig.

Botanical Origin—Cochlearia Armoracia L., a common perennial with a stout tapering root, large coarse oblong leaves with long stalks, and erect flowering racemes 2 to 3 feet high. It is indigenous to the eastern parts of Europe, from the Caspian through Russia and Poland to Finland. In Britain and in other parts of Europe from Sicily to the polar circle, it occurs cultivated or semi-wild; in the opinion of Schübeler[302] it is not truly indigenous to Norway.

History—The vernacular name Armon is stated by Pliny[303] to be used in the Pontic regions to designate the Armoracia of the Romans, the Wild Radish (ῤαϕανὶς ἀγρία) of the Greeks, a plant which cannot be positively identified with that under notice.

Horse-radish is called in the Russian language Chren, in Lithuanian Krenai, in Illyrian Kren, a name which has passed into several German dialects, and as Cran or Cranson into French.

From these and similar facts, De Candolle[304] has drawn the conclusion that the propagation of the plant has travelled from Eastern to Western Europe.

Both the root and leaves of horse-radish were used as a medicine and also eaten with food in Germany and Denmark during the middle ages.[305] But the use of the former was not common in England until a much later period. The plant is mentioned in the Meddygon Myddfai and was known in England as Red-cole in the time of Turner, 1568, but is not quoted by him[306] as used in food, nor is it noticed by Boorde,[307] 1542, in his chapter on edible roots. Gerarde[308] at the end of the 16th century remarks that horse-radish—“is commonly used among the Germans for sauce to eat fish with, and such like meats, as we do mustard.” Half a century later the taste for horse-radish had begun to prevail in England. Coles[309] (1657) states that the root sliced thin and mixed with vinegar is eaten as a sauce with meat as among the Germans. That the use of horse-radish in France had the same origin is proved by its old French name Moutarde des Allemands.

The root to which certain medicinal properties had always been assigned, was included in the materia medica of the London Pharmacopœias of the last century under the name of Raphanus rusticanus.

Description—The root which in good ground often attains a length of 3 feet and nearly an inch in diameter, is enlarged in its upper part into a crown, usually dividing into a few short branches each surmounted by a tuft of leaves, and annulated by the scars of fallen foliage; below the crown it tapers slightly, and then for some distance is often almost cylindrical, throwing off here and there filiform and long slender cylindrical roots, and finally dividing into two or three branches. The root is of a light yellowish-brown; internally it is fleshy and perfectly white, and has a short non-fibrous fracture. Before it is broken it is inodorous, but when comminuted it immediately exhales its characteristic pungent smell. Its well-known pungent taste is not lost in the root carefully dried and not kept too long.

A transverse section of the fresh root displays a large central column with a radiate and concentric arrangement of its tissues, which are separated by a small greyish circle from the bark, whose breadth is from ½ to 2 lines. In the root branches there is neither a well-defined liber nor a true pith. The short leaf-bearing branches include a large pith surrounded by a circle of woody bundles. The bark adheres strongly to the central portion, in which zones of annual growth are easily perceptible, at least in older specimens.

Microscopic Structure—The corky layer is made up of small tabular cells as usual in suberous coats. In the succeeding zone of the middle bark, thick-walled yellow cells are scattered through the parenchyme, chiefly at the boundary line of the corky layer. In the root the cellular envelope is not strikingly separated from the liber, whilst in its leafy branches this separation is well marked by wedge-shaped liber bundles, which are accompanied by a group of the yellow longitudinally-elongated stone-cells. The woody bundles contain a few short yellow vessels, accompanied by bundles of prosenchymatous, not properly woody cells. The centre, in the root, shows these woody bundles to be separated by the medullary parenchyma; in the branches the central column consists of an uniform pith without woody bundles, the latter forming a circle close to the cambium. The parenchyma of the whole root collected in spring is loaded with small starch granules.

Chemical Composition—Among the constituents of horse-radish root (the chemical history of which is however far from perfect) the volatile oil is the most interesting. The fresh root submitted to distillation with water in a glass retort, yields about ½ per mille of oil which is identical with that of Black Mustard as proved in 1843 by Hubatka. He combined it with ammonia and obtained crystals of thiosinammine, the composition of which agreed with the thiosinammine from mustard oil.

An alcoholic extract of the root is devoid of the odour of the oil, but this is quickly evolved on addition of an emulsion of White Mustard. The essential oil does not therefore pre-exist, but only sinigrin (myronate of potassium) and an albuminoid matter (myrosin) by whose mutual reaction in the presence of water it is formed ([p. 66]). This process does not go on in the growing root, perhaps because the two principles in question are not contained in the same cells, or else exist together in some condition that does not allow of their acting on each other,—a state of things analogous to that occurring in the leaves of Lauro-cerasus.

By exhausting the root with water either cold or hot, the sinigrin is decomposed and a considerable proportion of bisulphate is found in the concentrated decoction. Alcohol removes from the root some fatty matter and sugar (Winckler 1849). Salts of iron do not alter thin slices of it, tannic matters being absent. The presence of myrosin, which at present has been inferred rather than proved, ought to be further investigated. The root dried at 100° C afforded 11·15 per cent. of ash to Mutschler (1878).

Uses—An infusion or a distilled spirit of horse-radish is reputed stimulant, diaphoretic, and diuretic, but is not often employed.

Substitute—In India the root of Moringa pterygosperma Gärtn. is considered a substitute for horse-radish. It yields by distillation an essential oil of disgusting odour which Broughton, who obtained it in minute quantity, has assured us is not identical with that of mustard or of garlic.

CANELLACEÆ.

CORTEX CANELLÆ ALBÆ.

Canella Bark, Canella Alba Bark; F. Canelle blanche; G. Canella-Rinde.

Botanical Origin—Canella alba Murray,[310] a tree, 20 to 30 or even 50 feet in height, found in the south of Florida, the Bahama Islands (whence alone its bark is exported), Cuba, Jamaica, Ste. Broix, Guadaloupe, Martinique, Barbadoes and Trinidad.

History—The drug was first mentioned in 1605 by Clusius,[311] who remarks that it had been then newly brought to Europe and had received the name of Canella alba (White Cinnamon). It was afterwards known as Costus Corticosus, Costus dulcis, Cassia alba, Cassia lignea Jamaicensis or Jamaica Winter’s Bark. Dale[312] writing in 1693 notices it as not unfrequently sold for Winter’s Bark. Pomet[313] (1694) describes it as synonymous with Winter’s Bark, and observes that it is common, yet but little employed.

The drug is mentioned by most subsequent writers, some of whom like Pomet probably confounded it with the bark of Cinnamodendron ([p. 19]). It is usually described as produced in Jamaica or Guadaloupe, from which islands no Canella alba is now exported. On the other hand, New Providence, one of the Bahamas whence the Canella alba of the present day is shipped, is not named. Nor do we find any allusion to the drug in the records of the Company (1630-50) which was formed for the colonization of New Providence and the other islands of the group, though their staple productions are frequently enumerated.[314]

Canella alba Murr. was described and figured by Sloane (1707) and still better by Patrick Brown in 1789, and Olaf Swartz in 1791.[315]

Collection—In the Bahamas, where the drug is known as White-Wood Bark or Cinnamon Bark, it is collected thus:—preparatory to being stripped from the wood, the bark is gently beaten with a stick, which removes the suberous layer. By a further beating, the remaining bark is separated, and having been peeled off and dried, is exported without further preparation.[316]

Description—Canella bark occurs in the form of quills, more or less crooked and irregular, or in channelled pieces from 2 or 3 up to 6, 8, or more inches in length, ½ an inch to 1 or 2 inches in width, and a line or two in thickness. The suberous layer which here and there has escaped removal is silvery grey, and dotted with minute lichens. Commonly, the external surface consists of inner cellular layers (mesophlœum) of a bright buff, or light orange-brown tint, often a little wrinkled transversely, and dotted (but not always) with round scars. The inner surface is whitish or cinnamon-coloured, either smooth or with slight longitudinal striæ. Some parcels of canella show the bark much bruised and longitudinally fissured by the above-mentioned process of beating. The bark breaks transversely with a short granular fracture, which distinctly shows the three, or in uncoated specimens the two, cortical layers, that of the liber being the largest, and projecting by undulated rays or bundles into the middle layer, which presents numerous large and unevenly scattered oil-cells of a yellow colour.

Canella has an agreeable cinnamon-like odour, and a bitter, pungent acrid taste.[317] Even the corky coat is somewhat aromatic.

Microscopical Structure—The spongy suberous coat consists of very numerous layers of large cells with thin walls, showing an undulated rather than rectangular outline. The next small zone is constituted of sclerenchymatous cells in a single, double, or triple row, or forming dense but not very extensive groups. This tissue is sometimes (in unpeeled specimens) a continuous envelope, marking the boundary between the corky layer and the middle portion of the cellular layer; but an interruption in this thick-walled tissue often takes place when portions of it are enveloped and separated by the suberous layer.

The proper cellular envelope shows a narrow tissue with numerous very large cells filled with yellow essential oil. The liber forming the chief portion of the whole bark, exhibits thin prosenchymatous cells, which on traverse section form small bands of a peculiar horny or cartilaginous appearance, on which account they have been distinguished as horny liber (Hornbast of German writers).[318] The liber-fibres show reticulated marks due to the peculiar character of the secondary deposits on their cell-walls. The oil-cells in the liber are less numerous and smaller; the medullary rays are not very obvious unless on account of the crystalline tufts of oxalate of calcium deposited in the latter. This crystalline oxalate retains air obstinately, and has a striking dark appearance.

Chemical Composition—The most interesting body in canella is the volatile oil, examined in 1843 under Wöhler’s direction by Meyer and von Reiche, who obtained it in the proportion of 0·94 from 100 parts of bark. They found it to consist of four different oils, the first being identical with the Eugenol or Eugenic Acid of oil of cloves; the second is closely allied to the chief constituent of cajuput oil. The other oils require further examination.[319]

The bark, of which we distilled 20 lb., afforded 0·74 per cent. of oil. This when distilled with caustic potash in excess was found to be composed of 2 parts of the acid portion and 1 part of the neutral hydrocarbon; the latter has an odour suggesting a mixture of peppermint and cajuput.

Meyer and von Reiche evaporated the aqueous decoction of canella, and removed from the bitter extract by alcohol 8 per cent. of mannite, which they ascertained to be the so-called Canellin described in 1822 by Petroz and Robinet.

The bark yielded the German chemists 6 per cent. of ash, chiefly carbonate of calcium. The bitter principle has not yet been isolated. An aqueous infusion is not blackened by a persalt of iron.

Commerce—Canella alba is collected in the Bahama Islands and shipped to Europe from Nassau in New Providence, the chief seat of trade in the group. In 1876 the export of the bark amounted to 125 cwt.

Uses—The bark is an aromatic stimulant, now but seldom employed. It is used by the West Indian negroes as a condiment.

BIXINEÆ.

SEMEN GYNOCARDIÆ.

Chaulmugra Seed.

Botanical Origin—Gynocardia odorata R. Br. (Chaulmoogra Roxb., Hydnocarpus Lindl.), a large tree[320] with a globular fruit of the size of a shaddock, containing numerous seeds immersed in pulp. It grows in the forests of the Malayan peninsula and Eastern India as far north as Assam, extending thence along the base of the Himalaya westward to Sikkim.

History—The inhabitants of the south-eastern countries of Asia have long been acquainted with the seeds of certain trees of the tribe Pangieæ (ord. Bixineæ) as a remedy for maladies of the skin. In China a seed called Ta-fung-tsze is imported from Siam[321] where it is known as Lukrabo and used in a variety of cutaneous complaints. The tree affording it, which is figured in the Pun-tasao (circa a.d. 1596) has not been recognised by botanists, but from the structure of the seed it is obviously closely related to Gynocardia.[322]

The properties of G. odorata were known to Roxburgh who, Latinizing the Indian name of the tree, called it (1814) Chaulmoogra odorata. Of late years the seeds have attracted the notice of Europeans in India, and having been found useful in certain skin diseases, they have been admitted a place in the Pharmacopœia of India.

Description—The seeds, 1 to 1¼ inches long and about half as much in diameter, are of irregular ovoid form, and more or less angular or flattened by mutual pressure; they weigh on an average about 35 grains each. The testa is thin (about ¹/₅₀ of an inch), brittle, smooth, dull grey; within there is a brown oily kernel, marked with a darker colour at its basal end. The weight of the kernel is, on an average, twice that of the testa. The former encloses in its copious, soft albumen a pair of large, plain, leafy, heart-shaped cotyledons with a stout radicle. The taste of the kernel is simply oily.

Microscopic Structure—The testa is chiefly formed of cylindrical thick-walled cells. The albumen exhibits large angular cells containing fatty oil, masses of albuminous matter and tufted crystals of calcium oxalate. Starch is not present.

Chemical Composition—The kernels afforded us by means of ether 51·5 per cent. of fatty oil, which is almost colourless or somewhat brownish if the seeds are not fresh. Either extracted or expressed it is of no peculiar taste. The pressed oil concretes at 17° C.; that extracted by ether or bisulphide of carbon requires for solidification a lower temperature. The expressed oil is slightly fluorescent, less so that extracted by means of bisulphide of carbon. If the oil, either pressed or extracted, is diluted with the bisulphide, and then concentrated sulphuric or nitric acid is added, no peculiar coloration is produced.

From the powdered kernels deprived of oil, water removes the usual constituents, glucose, mucilage and albumin.

Uses—The seeds are said to have been advantageously used as an alternative tonic in scrofula, skin diseases and rheumatism. They should be freed from the testa, powdered, and given in the dose of 6 grains gradually increased. Reduced to a paste and mixed with Simple Ointment, they constitute the Unguentum Gynocardiæ of the Indian Pharmacopœia, which, as well as an expressed oil of the seeds may be employed externally in herpes, tinea, &c.[323]

Substitute—It has been suggested that the seeds of Hydnocarpus Wightiana Bl., a tree of Western India, and of H. venenata Gärtn., native of Ceylon, might be tried where those of Gynocardia are not procurable. The seeds of both species of Hydnocarpus (formerly confounded together as H. inebrians Vahl) afford a fatty oil which the natives use in cutaneous diseases.[324]

POLYGALEÆ.

RADIX SENEGÆ.

Radix Senekæ; Senega or Seneka Root; F. Racine de Polygala de Virginie; G. Senegawurzel.

Botanical Origin—Polygala Senega L., a perennial plant with slender ascending stems 6 to 12 inches high, and spikes of dull white flowers resembling in form those of the Common Milkwort of Britain. It is found in British America as far north as the river Saskatchewan, and in the United States from New England to Wisconsin, Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and the upper parts of North Carolina, as well as in Georgia and Texas, not in the Rocky Mountains.

The plant, which frequents rocky open woods and plains, has become somewhat scarce in the Atlantic states, and as a drug is now chiefly collected in the west, the plant growing profusely in Iowa and Minnesota, west of New York.

History—The employment of this root among the Seneca Indians as a remedy for the bite of the rattlesnake attracted the notice of Tennent, a Scotch physician in Virginia; and from the good effects he witnessed he concluded that it might be administered with advantage in pleurisy and peripneumonia. The result of numerous trials made in the years 1734 and 1735 proved the utility of the drug in these complaints, and Tennent communicated his observations to the celebrated Dr. Mead of London in the form of an epistle, afterwards published together with an engraving of the plant, then called the Seneca Rattlesnake Root.[325] Tennent’s practice was to administer the root in powder or as a strong decoction, or more often infused in wine. The new drug was favourably received in Europe, and its virtues discussed in numerous theses and dissertations, one written in 1749 being by Linnæus.[326]

Description—Senega root is developed at its upper end into a knotty crown, in old roots as much as an inch in diameter, from which spring the numerous wiry aerial stems, beset at the base with scaly rudimentary leaves often of a purplish hue. Below the crown is a simple tap-root ²/₁₀ to ³/₁₀ of an inch thick, of contorted or somewhat spiral form, which usually soon divides into 2 or 3 spreading branches and smaller filiform rootlets.

The bark is light yellowish-grey, translucent, horny, shrivelled, knotted and partially annulated. Very frequently a keel-shaped ridge occurs, running like a shrunken sinew through the principal root; it has no connexion with the wood, but originates in a one-sided development of the liber-tissue. The bark encloses a pure, white woody column about as thick as itself. After the root has been macerated in water the bark is easily peeled off, and the peculiar structure of the wood can then be studied. The latter immediately below the crown is a cylindrical cord, cleft however by numerous, fine, longitudinal fissures. Lower down these fissures increase in an irregular manner, causing a very abnormal development of the wood. Transverse sections of a root therefore differ greatly, the circular wood portion being either penetrated by clefts or wide notches, or one-half or even more is altogether wanting, the space where wood should exist being in each case filled up by uniform parenchymatous tissue.

Senega root has a short brittle fracture, a peculiar rancid odour, and a very acrid and sourish taste. When handled it disperses in irritating dust.

Microscopic Structure—The woody part is built up of dotted vessels surrounded by short porous ligneous cells; the medullary rays consist of one or two rows of the usual small cells. There is no pith in the centre of the root. The clefts and notches are filled up with an uniform tissue passing into the primary cortical tissue without a distinct liber; the large cells of this tissue are spirally striated. In the keel-shaped rider the proper liber rays may be distinguished from the medullary rays. The former are made up of a soft tissue, hence the cortical part of the root breaks short together with the wood.

Neither starch granules nor crystals of oxalate of calcium are present in this root; the chief contents of its tissue are albuminoid granules and drops of fatty oil.

Chemical Composition—The substance to which the drug owes its irritating taste was distinguished by the name of Senegin by Gehlen as early as 1804, and is probably the same as the Polygalic Acid of Quevenne (1836) and of Procter (1859). Christophsohn (1874) extracted it by means of boiling water, evaporated the solution and exhausted the residue with boiling alcohol (0·853 sp. gr.). The liquid after a day or two, deposits the crude senegin, which is to be washed with alcohol (0·813 sp. gr.), and again dissolved in water, from which it is precipitated by a large excess of hydrate of baryum. The barytic compound, dissolved in water, is decomposed by carbonic acid, by which carbonate of baryum is separated, senegin remaining in solution. It is lastly to be precipitated by alcohol. It is amorphous, insoluble in ether and in cold water; it forms with boiling water a frothing solution. Like saponin, to which it is very closely allied, it excites violent sneezing.

Dilute inorganic acids added to a warm solution of senegin throw down a flocculent jelly of Sapogenin, the liquid retaining in solution uncrystallizable sugar. Alkalis give rise to the same decomposition; but it is difficult to split up the senegin completely, and hence the formulas given for this process are doubtful. Even the formula of senegin itself is not definitely settled. According to Christophsohn, the root yields about 2 per cent. of this substance; according to earlier authorities, who doubtless had it less pure, a much larger proportion. From Schneider’s investigations (1875) it would appear that the rootlets are richest in senegin.

Senega root contains a little volatile oil, traces of resin, also gum, salts of malic acid, yellow colouring matter, and sugar (7 per cent. according to Rebling, 1855). The Virginic Acid said by Quevenne to be contained in it, and the bitter substance Isolusin mentioned by Peschier, are doubtful bodies.

Uses—Senega is prescribed as a stimulating expectorant and diuretic, useful in pneumonia, asthma and rheumatism. It is much esteemed in America.

Adulteration—The drug is not liable to be wilfully falsified, but through careless collecting there is occasionally a slight admixture of other roots. One of these is American Ginseng (Panax quinquefolium L.) a spindle-shaped root which may be found here and there both in senega and serpentaria. The rhizome of Cypripedium pubescens Willd. has also been noticed; it cannot be confounded with that of Polygala Senega. The same may be said with regard to the rhizome of Cynanchum Vincetoxicum R. Brown (Asclepias L., Vincetoxicum officinale Mönch).

RADIX KRAMERIÆ.

Radix Ratanhiæ, Rhatanhiæ v. Rathaniæ; Rhatany or Rhatania Root, Peruvian or Payta Rhatany; F. Racine de Ratanhia; G. Ratanhiawurzel.[327]

Botanical Origin—Krameriæ triandra Ruiz et Pav., a small woody shrub with an upright stem scarcely a foot high and thick decumbent branches 2 to 3 feet long.[328] It delights in the barren sandy declivities of the Bolivian and Peruvian Cordilleras at 3000 to 8000 feet above the sea-level, often occurring in great abundance and adorning the ground with its red star-like flowers and silver-grey foliage.

The root is gathered chiefly to the north, north-east, and east of Lima, as at Caxatambo, Huanuco, Tarma, Jauja, Huarochiri and Canta; occasionally on the high lands about lake Titicaca. It appears likewise to be collected in the northern part of Peru, since the drug is now frequently shipped from Payta.

History—Hipolito Ruiz,[329] the Spanish botanist, observed in 1784 that the women of Huanuco and Lima were in the habit of using for the preservation of their teeth a root which he recognized as that of Krameria triandra, a plant discovered by himself in 1779. On his return to Europe he obtained admission for this root into Spain in 1796, whence it was gradually introduced into other countries of Europe.

The first supplies which reached England formed part of the cargo of a Spanish prize, and were sold in the London drug sales at the commencement of the present century. Some fell into the hands of Dr. Reece who recommended it to the profession.[330]

About 20 years ago there appeared in the European market some other kinds of rhatany previously unknown: of these the more important are noticed at pp. [81], [82].

Description—The root which attains a considerable size in proportion to the aerial part of the shrub, consists of a short thick crown, sometimes much knotted and as large as a man’s fist. This ramifies beneath the soil even more than above, throwing out an abundance of branching, woody roots (frequently horizontal) some feet long and ¼ to ½ an inch thick. These long roots used formerly to be found in commerce; but of late years rhatany has consisted in large proportion of the more woody central part of the root with short stumpy branches, which from their broken and bruised appearance have evidently been extracted with difficulty from a hard soil.

The bark which is scaly and rugged, and ⅒ to ¹/₂₀ of an inch in thickness, is of a dark reddish-brown. It consists of a loose cracked cork-layer, mostly smooth in the smaller roots, covering a bright brown-red inner bark, which adheres though not very firmly to a brownish yellow wood. The bark is rather tough, breaking with a fibrous fracture. The wood is dense, without pith, but marked with thin vessels arranged in concentric rings, and with still thinner, dark medullary rays. The taste of the bark is purely astringent; the wood is almost tasteless; neither possesses any distinctive odour.

Kr. cistoidea Hook, a plant scarcely to be distinguished from Kr. triandra, affords in Chili a rhatany very much like that of Peru. Its root was contributed to the Paris Exhibition of 1867.

Microscopic Structure—The chief portion of the bark is formed of liber, which in transverse section exhibits numerous bundles of yellow fibres separated by parenchymatous tissue and traversed by narrow brown medullary rays. The small layer of the primary bark is made up of large cells, the surface of the root of large suberous cells imbued with red matter. The latter also occurs in the inner cortical tissue, and ought to be removed by means of ammonia in order to get a clear idea of the structure. Many of the parenchymatous cells are loaded with starch granules; oxalate of calcium occurs in the neighbourhood of the liber bundles. The woody portion exhibits no structure of particular interest.

Chemical Composition—Wittstein (1854) found in the bark of rhatany (the only part of the drug having active properties) about 20 per cent. of a form of tannin called Ratanhia-tannic Acid, closely related to catechu-tannic acid. It is an amorphous powder, the solution of which is not affected by emetic tartar, but yields with ferric chloride a dark greenish precipitate. By distillation Eissfeldt (1854) obtained pyrocatechin as a product of the decomposition of ratanhia-tannic acid. The latter is also decomposed by dilute acids which convert it into crystallizable sugar and Ratanhia-red, a substance nearly insoluble in water, also occurring in abundance ready formed in the bark.

Grabowski (1867) showed that by fusing ratanhia-red with caustic potash, protocatechuic acid and phloroglucin[331] are obtained. Ratanhia-red has the composition C₂₆H₂₂O₁₁, the same, according to Grabowski, as an analogous product of the decomposition of the peculiar tannic acid occurring (as shown by Rochleder in 1866) in the horse-chestnut. The same red substance may also be obtained, as stated by Rembold (1868), from the tannic acid of the root of tormentil (Potentilla Tormentilla L.).

As to rhatany root, Wittstein also found it to contain wax, gum and uncrystallizable sugar (even in the wood! according to Cotton[332]). Cotton further pointed out the presence in very minute quantity of an odorous, volatile, solid body, obtainable by means of ether or bisulphide of carbon; it occurs in a somewhat more considerable amount in the other sorts of rhatany. The root contains no gallic acid.

A dry extract of rhatany resembling kino used formerly to be imported from South America, but how and where manufactured we know not. It is however of some interest as containing a crystalline body which Wittstein who discovered it (1854) regards as Tyrosin, C₉H₁₁O₃, previously supposed to be exclusively of animal origin.[333] Städeler and Ruge (1862) assigned to it a slightly different composition, C₁₀H₁₃NO₃, and gave it the name of Ratanhin. It dissolves in hot water which is acidulated by a little nitric acid; the solution on boiling turns red, blue, and lastly green, and becomes at the same time fluorescent. Kreitmair (1875) extracted 0·7 per cent, of ratanhin from an old specimen of commercial extract of rhatany; but he did not succeed in obtaining it from other specimens. He also showed that ratanhin is not a constituent of the roots of Krameria. The same substance has been abundantly found by Gintl (1868) in the natural exudation called Resina d’Angelim pedra[334] which is met with in the alburnum of Ferreirea spectabilis Allem., a large Brazilian tree of the order Leguminosæ (tribe Sophoreæ). Peckolt, who first extracted it, named it Angelin; it forms colourless, neutral crystals yielding compounds both with alkalis and acids, which have been investigated by Gintl in 1869 and 1870.

Uses—Rhatany is a valuable astringent, but is not much employed in Great Britain.

Other sorts of Rhatany—Of the 20 to 25 other species of Krameria, all of them belonging to America, several have astringent roots which have been collected and used in the place of the rhatany of Peru. The most important of these drugs is that known as—

Para Rhatany,—so called from having been shipped from Pará in Brazil. Berg who described it in 1865 termed it Brazilian Rhatany, Cotton in 1868, Ratanhia des Antilles. It is a drug nearly resembling the following, but of a darker and less purple hue; it is also in longer sticks which are remarkably flexible, and covered with a thick bark having numerous transverse cracks.[335] It is apparently derived from the Krameria argentea of Martius,[336] the root of which is collected in the dry districts of the provinces of Bahia and Minas Geraes, that plant growing throughout north-eastern Brazil. It is also called Rhatany from Ceará.

Savanilla or New Granada Rhatany. The plant yielding it is Krameria tomentosa St. Hil. (Kr. Ixina var. β granatensis Triana, Kr. grandifolia Berg), a shrub 4 to 6 feet high covering large arid tracts in the valley of Jiron between Pamplona and the Magdalena in New Granada, in which locality the collection of the root was observed by Weir in 1864.[337] According to Triana it also grows at Socorro, south of Jiron. The same plant is found near Santa Marta and Rio Hacha in north-eastern New Granada, in British Guiana, and in the Brazilian provinces of Pernambuco and Goyaz.

The stem or root-crown of Savanilla rhatany is never so knotty and irregular as that of the Peruvian drug, nor are the roots so long or so thick. Separate pieces of root of sinuous form, 4 to 6 inches long and ²/₁₀ to ³/₁₀ of an inch thick are most frequent. The drug is moreover well distinguished by its dull purplish brown colour, its thick smooth bark marked with longitudinal furrows, and here and there with deep transverse cracks, and by the bark not easily splitting off as it does in common rhatany.

The anatomical difference depends chiefly upon the more abundant development of the bark which in thickness is ⅓ to ¼ the diameter of the wood. In Peruvian rhatany the cortical layer attains only ⅙ to ⅛ of the diameter of the woody column. The greater firmness of the suberous coat in Savanilla rhatany is due to its cells being densely filled with colouring matter.

Savanilla rhatany differs from the Peruvian root in its tannic matter. This becomes evident by shaking the powdered root (or bark) with water and iron reduced by hydrogen. The liquid filtered from the Savanilla sort and diluted with distilled water exhibits an intense violet colour, that from Peruvian rhatany a dingy brown; the latter turns light red by alkalis. Thin sections of the Peruvian root assume a greyish hue when moistened with a ferrous salt; Savanilla root by a similar treatment displays the above violet colour. The Savanilla root is richer in soluble matter and from the greater development of its bark may deserve to be preferred for medicinal use.

In the English market, Savanilla root is of less frequent occurrence than that of Pará.

A kind of rhatany attributed to Krameria secundiflora DC., a herbaceous plant of Mexico, Texas and Arkansas, was furnished to Berg in 1854, but has not been in commerce. Its anatomical structure has been described by Berg.[338]

GUTTIFERÆ.

CAMBOGIA.

Gummi Gambogia, Gummi Gutti; Gamboge; F. Gomme Gutte; G. Gutti, Gummigutt.

Botanical Origin—Garcinia Morella Desrousseaux, var. β. pedicellata, a diœcious tree,[339] with handsome laurel-like foliage and small yellow flowers, found in Camboja, Siam (province of Chantibun and the islands on the east coast of the gulf of Siam), and in the southern parts of Cochin China. It was introduced about thirty years ago into Singapore where several specimens are still thriving (1873) on the estate of Dr. Jamie. The finest is now a tree of 20 feet high, with a trunk a foot in diameter, and a thick, spreading head of foliage.

G. Morella Desr.—The typical form of this tree having sessile male flowers grows in moist forests of Southern India and Ceylon, and is capable of affording good gamboge.

G. pictoria Roxb., a large tree of Southern India, produces a sort of gamboge found by Christian (1846) essentially the same as that of Siam. It has been examined more recently by Broughton (1871) who states it to be quite equal to that of G. Morella. We have also been unable to find any difference between the product of G. pictoria as sent from Ceylon and common gamboge. Garcinia pictoria moreover is thought by Sir Jos. Hooker to agree with G. Morella.

History—The Chinese had intercourse with Camboja as early as the time of the Sung dynasty (a.d. 970-1127); and a Chinese traveller who visited the latter country in 1295-97, describes gamboge and the method of obtaining it by incisions in the stem of the tree.[340] The celebrated Chinese herbal Pun-tsao, written towards the close of the 16th century, mentions gamboge (Tang-hwang) and gives a rude figure of the tree. The drug is regarded by the Chinese as poisonous, and is scarcely employed except as a pigment.

The first notice of the occurrence of gamboge in Europe is in the writings of Clusius[341] who describes a specimen brought from China by the Dutch Admiral, Jacob van Neck, and given to him in 1603, under the name of Ghittaiemou.[342] It appears that shortly after this time it began to be employed in medicine in Europe, for in 1611, Michael Reuden, a physician of Bamberg, made use of it as he stated in 1613.[343] He termed the drug a “novum gummi purgans,” or also, Gummi de Peru, the latter strange name no doubt being a corruption of the above mentioned Ghittaiemou. The appellation “gummi de Peru” is met with in pharmaceutical tariffs during the 17th and 18th centuries.

Gamboge is one of the articles of the tariff of the pharmaceutical shops of the City of Frankfort in 1612: “Gutta gemou, a strong purgative dried juice, coming from the Kingdom of Patana in the East Indies.” Patana or Patani is the most populous province of the east coast of the peninsula of Malacca. The Dutch established there a factory in 1602, and were followed in 1612 by the English. The settlement was abandoned in 1700; gamboge was probably brought there from the opposite shore of the gulf of Siam.[344]

In 1615, a considerable quantity of gamboge was offered for sale in London by the East Indian Company. The entry respecting it in the Court Minute Books of the company under date October 13, 1615, is to this effect:—Three chests, one rundlet, and a basket, containing 13, 14, or 15 hundredweights, more or less, of Cambogium “a drugge unknown here,”—the use of which, was much commended as a “a gentle purge,” were offered for sale at 5s. per lb., but met with no purchaser.

Jacob Bontius,[345] a Dutch physician, resident, towards 1629, in Batavia, stated that “gutta Cambodja,” as he termed the drug, came from the country of the same name; he supposed it to be derived from an Euphorbiaceous plant.

Parkinson,[346] who was an apothecary of London and wrote in 1640, speaks of this “Cambugio,” called by some Catharticum aureum, as a drug of recent importation which arrived in the form of “wreathes or roules” yellow within and without.

In the London Pharmacopœia of 1650, gamboge is called Gutta Gamba[347] or Ghitta jemou.

The mother plant of the drug was not fully examined and figured until 1864; yet in 1677 already, Hermann, a German physician residing in Ceylon, had pointed out that it was a Garcinia.[348]

Secretion—We have examined a portion of a branch two inches in diameter of the gamboge-tree,[349] and have found the yellow gum-resin to be contained chiefly in the middle layer of the bark in numerous ducts like those occurring in the roots of Inula Helenium and other roots of the same natural order. A little is also secreted in the dotted vessels of the outermost layer of the wood, and in the pith. The wood, which is white, acquires a bright yellow tint when exposed to the vapour of ammonia or to alkaline solutions.

Production—At the commencement of the rainy season the gamboge-collectors start for the forest in search of the trees which in some localities are plentiful. Having found one of the full size they make a spiral incision in the bark round half the circumference of the trunk, and place a joint of bamboo to receive the sap which slowly exudes for several months. When it first issues from the tree, it is a yellowish fluid, which after passing through a viscid state hardens into the gamboge of commerce. >

The trees grow both in the valleys and on the mountains and will yield on an average in one season enough to fill three joints of bamboo 20 inches in length by 1½ inches in diameter. The tree appears to suffer no injury provided the tapping is not more frequent than every other year.[350]

According to Dr. Jamie of Singapore, the gamboge-tree grows most luxuriantly in the dense jungles. The best time for collecting is from February to March or April. The trees, the larger the better, are wounded by a parang or chopping-knife, in various parts of the trunk and large branches, when prepared bamboos are inserted between the root and the bark of the trees. The bamboo cylinders being tied or inserted, are examined daily till filled, which generally takes from 15 to 30 days. Then the bamboos are taken to a fire, over which they are gradually rotated till the water in the gum-resin is evaporated and it gets sufficiently hard to allow of the bamboo being torn off.[351]

Description—The drug arrives in the form of sticks or cylinders 1 to 2½ inches in diameter, and 4 to 8 inches in length, striated lengthwise with impressions from the inside of the bamboo. Often the sticks are agglutinated, or folded, or the drug is in compressed or in shapeless masses. It is when good of a rich brownish orange tint, dense and homogeneous, breaking easily with a conchoidal fracture, scarcely translucent even in thin splinters. Touched with water it instantly forms a yellow emulsion. Triturated in a mortar it affords a brilliant yellow powder, slightly odorous. Gamboge has a disagreeable acrid taste.

Much of the gamboge shipped to Europe is of inferior quality, being of a brownish hue or exhibiting when broken a rough, granular, bubbly surface. Sometimes it arrives imperfectly dried and still soft.

Chemical Composition—Gamboge consists of a mixture of resin with 15 to 20 per cent. of gum. The resin dissolves easily in alcohol, forming a clear liquid of fine yellowish-red hue, and not decidedly acid reaction. It forms darker-coloured solutions with ammonia or the fixed alkalis, and a copious precipitate with basic acetate of lead. Perchloride of iron colours a solution of the resin deep blackish brown.

By fusing purified gamboge resin with potash, Hlasiwetz and Barth (1866) obtained acetic acid and other acids of the same series, together with phloroglucin, C₆H₃(OH)₃, pyrotartaric acid, C₅H₈O₄, and isuvitinic acid, C₆H₃CH₃(COOH)₂.

The gum which we obtained to the extent of 15·8 per cent. by completely exhausting gamboge with alcohol and ether, was found readily soluble in water. The solution does not redden litmus, and is not precipitated by neutral acetate of lead, nor by perchloride of iron, nor by silicate or biborate of sodium. It is therefore not identical with gum arabic.

Commerce—The drug finds its way to Europe from Camboja by Singapore, Bangkok, or Saigon. In 1877 the first place exported 240 peculs, Bangkok in 1875 no less than 346 peculs, value 48,835 dollars; from Saigon there have of late been shipped from 30 to 40 peculs annually (one pecul = 133·3 lbs. = 60·479 kilogrammes).[352]

Uses—Gamboge is a drastic purgative, seldom administered except in combination with other substances.

Adulteration—The Cambojans adulterate gamboge with rice flour, sand, or the pulverized bark of the tree,[353] which substances may be easily detected in the residue left after exhausting the drug successively by spirit of wine and cold water.

Other Sources of Gamboge—Although the gamboge of European commerce appears to be exclusively derived from the form of the plant named at the head of this article, Garcinia travancorica Beddome, is capable of yielding a similar drug which may be collected to some small extent for local use, but not for exportation. It is a beautiful tree of the southern forests of Travancore and the Tinnevelly Ghats (3,000 to 4,500 feet). According to its discoverer Lieut. Beddome,[354] it yields an abundance of bright yellow gamboge.

OLEUM GARCINIÆ.

Concrete Oil of Mangosteen, Kokum Butter.

Botanical Origin.—Garcinia indica Choisy (G. purpurea Roxb. Brindonia indica Dup. Th.), an elegant tree with drooping branches and dark green leaves.[355] It bears a smooth round fruit the size of a small apple, containing an acid purple pulp in which are lodged as many as 8 seeds. The tree is a native of the coast region of Western India known as the Concan, lying between Daman and Goa.

History—The fruit is mentioned by Garcia d’Orta(1563) as known to the Portuguese of Goa by the name of Brindones. He states that it has a pleasant taste though very sour, and that it is used in dyeing; and further that the peel serves to make a sort of vinegar. Several succeeding authors (as Bauhin and Ray) have contented themselves with repeating this account.

As to the fruit yielding a fatty oil, we find no reference to such fact till about the year 1830, when it was stated in an Indian newspaper[356] that an oil of the seeds is well known at Goa and often used to adulterate ghee (liquid butter). It was afterwards pointed out as the result of some experiments that the oil was of an agreeable bland taste and well adapted for use in pharmacy. A short article on Kokum Butter was published by Pereira[357] in 1851. With the view of bringing the substance into use for pharmaceutical preparations in India, it has been introduced into the Pharmacopœia of India of 1868.

Preparation—The seeds are reniform, somewhat crescent-shaped or oblong, laterally compressed and wrinkled, ⁶/₁₀ to ⁸/₁₀ of an inch long by about ⁴/₁₀ broad. Each seed weighs on an average about eight grains. The thick cotyledons, which are inseparable,[358] have a mild oily taste. Examination under the microscope shows them to be built up of large reticulated cells containing a considerable proportion of crystalline fat readily soluble in benzol. In addition globular masses of albuminous matter occur which with iodine assume a brownish yellow hue. With perchloride of iron the walls strike a greenish-black.

The process followed by the natives of India (by whom alone the oil is prepared) has been thus described:—The seeds having been dried by exposure for some days to the sun are bruised, and boiled in water. The oil collects on the surface, and concretes when cool into a cake which requires to be purified by melting and straining.

Description—Kokum Butter is found in the Indian bazaars in the form of egg-shaped or oblong lumps about 4 inches long by 2 inches in diameter, and weighing about a quarter of a pound. It is a whitish substance, at ordinary temperatures, firm, dry, and friable, yet greasy to the touch. Scrapings (which are even pulverulent) when examined in glycerin under the microscope show it to be thoroughly crystalline. They have a mild oily taste, yet redden litmus if moistened with alcohol.

By filtration in a steam-bath, kokum butter is obtained perfectly transparent and of a light straw-colour, concentrating again at 27·5° C. into a white crystalline mass: some crystals appear even at 30°. Melted in a narrow tube, cooled and then warmed in a water bath, the fat begins to melt at 42·5 C., and fuses entirely at 45°. The residue left after filtration of the crude fat is inconsiderable, and consists chiefly of brown tannic matters soluble in spirit of wine.

When kokum butter is long kept it acquires an unpleasant rancid smell and brownish hue, and an efflorescence of shining tufted crystals appears on the surface of the mass.

Chemical Composition—Purified kokum butter boiled with caustic soda yields a fine hard soap which, when decomposed with sulphuric acid, affords a crystalline cake of fatty acids weighing as much as the original fat. The acids were again combined with soda and the soap having been decomposed, they were dissolved in alcohol of about 94 per cent. By slow cooling and evaporation crystals were first formed which, when perfectly dried, melted at 69·5° C.: they are consequently Stearic Acid. A less considerable amount of crystals which separated subsequently had a fusing point of 55°, and may be referred to Myristic Acid.

A portion of the crude fat was heated with oxide of lead and water, and the plumbic compound dried and exhausted with ether, which after evaporation left a very small amount of liquid oil, which we refer to Oleic Acid.

Finally the sulphuric acid used at the outset of the experiments was saturated and examined in the usual manner for volatile fatty acids (butyric, valerianic, &c.) but with negative results.

The fat of the seeds of G. indica was extracted by ether and examined chemically in 1857 by J. Bouis and d’Oliveira Pimentel.[359] It was obtained to the extent of 30 per cent., was found to fuse at 40° C. and to consist chiefly of stearin (tristearin). The seeds yielded 1·72 per cent. of nitrogen. Their residue after exhaustion by ether afforded to alkaline solutions or alcohol a fine red colour.

Uses—The results of the experiments above-noted show that kokum butter is well suited for some pharmaceutical preparations. It might also be advantageously employed in candle-making, as it yields stearic acid more easily and in a purer state than tallow and most other fats. But that it is possible to obtain it in quantities sufficiently large for important industrial uses, appears to us very problematical.

DIPTEROCARPEÆ.

BALSAMUM DIPTEROCARPI.

Balsamun Gurjunæ; Gurjun Balsam, Wood Oil.

Botanical Origin—This drug is yielded by several trees of the genus Dipterocarpus, namely—

D. turbinatus Gärtn. f. (D. lævis Ham., D. indicus Bedd), a native of Eastern Bengal, Chittagong and Pegu to Singapore, and French Cochin China.

D. incanus Roxb., a tree of Chittagong and Pegu.

D. alatus Roxb., growing in Chittagong, Burma, Tenasserim, the Andaman Islands, Siam, and French Cochin China.

D. zeylanicus Thw. and D. hispidus Thw., indigenous to Ceylon.

D. crispalatus ... abounding, together with D. turbinatus and D. alatus, in French Cochin China.

D. trinervis Bl., a native of Java and the Philippines, and D. gracilis Bl., D. littoralis Bl., D. retusus Bl. (D. Spanoghei Bl.), trees of Java supply a similar useful product which as yet appears to be of less commercial importance.[360]

The Gurjun trees are said by Hooker[361] to be among the most magnificent of the forests of Chittagong. They are conspicuous for their gigantic size, and for the straightness and graceful form of their tall unbranched trunk, and small symmetrical crown of broad glossy leaves. Many individuals are upwards of 200 feet high and 15 feet in girth.

History—Gurjun balsam was enumerated as one of the productions of Ava by Francklin[362] in 1811, and in 1813 it was briefly noticed by Ainslie.[363] Its botanical origin was first made known by Roxburgh, who also described the method by which it is extracted.

The medicinal properties of Gurjun balsam were pointed out by O’Shaughnessy[364] as entirely analogous to those of copaiba; and his observations were confirmed by many practitioners in India. This has obtained for the drug a place in the Pharmacopœia of India (1868).

Extraction—A recent account of the production of this drug is found in the Reports of the Jury of the Madras Exhibition of 1855. It is there stated that Wood Oil, as the balsam is commonly called, is obtained for the most part from the coast of Burma and the Straits, and is procured by tapping the trees about the end of the dry season. Several deep incisions are made with an axe into the trunk of the tree and a good-sized cavity scooped out. In this, fire is placed, and kept burning until the wood is somewhat scorched, when the balsam begins to exude, and is then led away into a vessel of bamboo. It is afterwards allowed to settle, when a clear liquid separates from a thick portion called the “guad.” The oil is extracted year after year, and sometimes there are two or three holes in the same tree. It is produced in extraordinary abundance; from 30 to 40 gallons according to Roxburgh may sometimes be obtained from a single tree in the course of a season, during which it is necessary to remove from time to time the old charred surface of the wood and burn afresh.

If a growing tree is felled and cut into piece, the oleo-resin exudes and concretes on the wood, very much, it is said, resembling camphor (?) and having an aromatic smell.

Description—As Gurjun balsam is the produce of different trees as well as of different countries, it is not surprising to find that it varies considerably in its properties.

The following observations refer to a balsam of which 400 lb. were recently imported from Moulmein for a London drug firm. It is a thick and viscid fluid, exhibiting a remarkable fluorescence, so that when seen by reflected light it appears opaque and of dingy greenish grey; yet when placed between the observer and strong daylight it is seen to be perfectly transparent and of a dark reddish-brown.[365] It has a weak aromatic copaiba-like odour and a bitterish aromatic taste without the persistent acridity of copaiba. Its sp. gr. at 16·9° C. is 0·964.

With the following liquids Gurjun affords perfectly clear solutions which are more or less fluorescent, namely pure benzol (from benzoate of calcium), cumol, chloroform, sulphide of carbon, essential oils. On the other hand, it is not entirely soluble in methylic, ethylic, or amylic alcohol; in ether, acetic ether, glacial acetic acid, acetone, phenol (carbolic acid), or in caustic potash dissolved in absolute alcohol. Many samples of commercial benzin also are not capable of dissolving the oleo-resin perfectly, but we have not ascertained on what constituent of such benzin this depends. We have further noticed that that portion of petroleum which is known as Petroleum Ether, containing the most volatile hydrocarbons, does not wholly dissolve the oleo-resin. One hundred parts of the balsam warmed and shaken with 1000 parts of absolute alcohol yielded on cooling a precipitate of resin amounting when dried to 18·5 parts. All concentrated solutions of the balsam are precipitated by amylic alcohol.

If the balsam is kept for a long time in a stoppered vessel at 100° C. it simply becomes a little turbid; but about 130° C. it is transformed into a jelly, and on cooling does not resume its former fluidity. Balsam of copaiba heated in a closed glass tube to 220° C. does not at all lose its fluidity, whereas Gurjun balsam becomes an almost solid mass.

Chemical Composition—Of the balsam 6·99 grammes dissolved in benzol and kept in a water bath until the residue ceased to lose weight, yielded 3·80 grammes of a dry, transparent, semi-fluid resin, corresponding to 54·44 per cent., and 45·56 of volatile matters expelled by evaporation. But another sample afforded us much less residue. By submitting larger quantities of the above balsam to the usual process of distillation with water in a large copper still, 37 per cent. of volatile oil were easily obtained. The water passing over at the same time did not redden litmus paper. A dark, viscid, liquid resin remained in the still.

The essential oil is of a pale straw-colour and less odorous than most other volatile oils. Treated with chloride of calcium and again distilled, it begins to boil at 210° C. and passes over at 255°-260° C., acquiring a somewhat empyreumatic smell and light yellowish tint. The purified oil has a sp. gr. of 0·915;[366] it is but sparingly soluble in absolute alcohol or glacial acetic acid, but mixes readily with amylic alcohol.

According to Werner (1862) this oil has the composition C₂₀H₃₂ like that of copaiba. He says it deviates the ray of polarized light to the left, but that prepared by one of us deviated strongly to the right, the residual resin dissolved in benzol being wholly inactive. The oil does not form a crystalline compound with dry hydrochloric acid, which colours it of a beautiful blue.[367] De Vry[368] states that the essential oil after this treatment deviates the ray to the right.

The resin contains, like that of copaiba, a small proportion of a crystallizable acid which may be removed by warming it with ammonia in weak alcohol. That part of the resin which is insoluble even in absolute alcohol,[369] we found to be uncrystallizable. The Gurgunic Acid, as the crystallized resinous acid is called by Werner,[370] but which it is more correct to write Gurjunic, may consequently be prepared by extracting the resin with alcohol (·838) and mixing the solution with ammonia. From the ammoniacal solution gurjunic acid is precipitated on addition of a mineral acid, and if it is again dissolved in ether and alcohol it may be procured in the form of small crystalline crusts. From the specimen under examination we were not successful in obtaining indubitable crystals.

Gurjunic acid, C₄₄H₆₈O₈ according to Werner, melts at 220° C., and concretes again at 180° C.; it begins to boil at 260° C., yet at the same time decomposition takes place. By assigning to this acid the formula C₄₄H₆₄O₅ + 3H₂O, which agrees well with Werner’s analytical results, we may regard it as a hydrate of abietinic acid, the chemical behaviour of which is perfectly analogous. Gurjunic acid is soluble in alcohol 0·838, but not in weak alcohol; it is dissolved also by ether, benzol, or sulphide of carbon (Werner).

In copaiba from Maracaibo, Strauss (1865) discovered Metacopaivic Acid which is probably identical with gurjunic; the former, however, fuses at 206° C.

The amorphous resin forming the chief bulk of the residue of the distillation of the balsam, has not yet been submitted to exact analysis. We find that after complete desiccation it is not soluble in absolute alcohol. A crystallized constituent of Gurjun, which we obtained from a balsam of unknown origin, has been shown[371] to answer to the formula C₂₈H₄₆O₂. Its crystals, belonging to the asymmetric system, melt at 126°-130°C.; they are entirely devoid of acid character. A comparative examination of the product of each of the above named species of Dipterocarpus would be highly desirable.

Commerce—Gurjun balsam is exported from Singapore, Moulmein, Akyab and the Malayan Peninsula, and is a common article of trade in Siam. It is likewise produced in Canara in Southern India. It is occasionally shipped to Europe. More than 2000 lb. were offered for sale in London under the name of East India Balsam Capivi, 4th October 1855; and in October 1858, a no less quantity than 45 casks appeared in the catalogue of a London drug-broker. It is now not unfrequent in the London drug sales.

Uses—In medicine it has hitherto been employed only as a substitute for copaiba, and chiefly in the hospitals of India.

In the East its great use is as a natural varnish, either alone or combined with pigments; and also as a substitute for tar as an application to the seams of boats, and for preserving timber from the attacks of the white ant. To the first application it is often made better appropriated[372] by boiling it, so that the essential oil is evaporated.

Wood Oil of China—The oleo-resin of Dipterocarpus must not be confounded with the so-called Wood Oil of China, which is of a totally different nature. The latter is a fatty oil expressed from the seeds of Aleurites cordata Müll. Arg. (Dryandra cordata Thunb. Elaeococca Vernicia Sprgl. Prodromus xv. part 2, p. 724), the well-known Tung tree of the Chinese. It is a large tree of the order Euphorbiaceæ, found in China and Japan. The oil is an article of enormous consumption among the Chinese, who use it in the caulking and painting of junks and boats, for preserving woodwork, varnishing furniture, and also in medicine. In the commercial reports of H.M. Consuls in China (No. 5, 1875, p. 3, 26) we find that this oil is largely exported from Hankow: 199·654 peculs in 1874, and forms an article of import at Ningpo: 15·123 peculs in 1874 (pecul = 133·33 lb. avoirdupois). It is, however, not shipped to foreign countries. The oil of the Tung tree is also extremely remarkable on account of its chemical properties as shown by Cloëz (1875-1877).

MALVACEÆ.

RADIX ALTHÆÆ

Marshmallow Root; F. Racine de Guimauve; G. Eibischwurzel.

Botanical Origin—Althæa officinalis L., the marshmallow, grows in moist places throughout Europe, Asia Minor, and the temperate parts of Western and Northern Asia, but is by no means universally distributed. It prefers saline localities such as in Spain the salt marshes of Saragossa, the low-lying southern coasts of France near Montpellier, Southern Russia, and the neighbourhood of salt-springs in Central Europe. In southern Siberia Althæa has been met with by Semenoff (1857) ascending as high as 3,000 feet in the Alatau mountains, south of the Balkash Lake.

In Britain it occurs in the low grounds bordering the Thames below London, and here and there in many other spots in the south of England and of Ireland.

The cultivated marshmallow thrives as far north as Throndhjem in Norway, and has been naturalized in North America (salt marshes of New England and New York) and Australia. It is largely cultivated in Bavaria and Württemberg.

History—Marshmallow had many uses in ancient medicine, and is described by Dioscorides as Άλθαία, a name derived from the Greek verb ἀλθειν, to heal.

The diffusion of the plant in Europe during the middle ages was promoted by Charlemagne who enjoined[373] its culture (a.d. 812) under the name of “Mismalvas, id est alteas quod dicitur ibischa.”

Description—The plant has a perennial root attaining about a foot in length and an inch in diameter. For medicinal use the biennial roots of the cultivated plant are chiefly employed. When fresh they are externally yellowish and wrinkled, white within and of tender fleshy texture. Previous to drying, the thin outer and a portion of the middle bark are scraped off, and the small root filaments are removed. The drug thus prepared and dried consists of simple whitish sticks 6 to 8 inches long, of the thickness of the little finger to that of a quill, deeply furrowed longitudinally and marked with brownish scars. Its central portion, which is pure white, breaks with a short fracture, but the bark is tough and fibrous. The dried root is rather flexible and easily cut. Its transverse section shows the central woody column of undulating outline separated from the thick bark by a fine dark outline shaded off outwards.

The root has a peculiar though very faint odour, and is of rather mawkish and insipid taste, and very slimy when chewed.

Microscopic Structure—The greater part of the bark consists of liber, abounding in long soft fibres, to which the toughness of the cortical tissue is due. They are branched and form bundles, each containing from 3 to 30 fibres separated by parenchymatous tissue. Of the cortical parenchyme many cells are loaded with starch granules, others contain stellate groups of oxalate of calcium, and a considerable number of somewhat larger cells are filled with mucilage. The last named on addition of alcohol is seen to consist of different layers.

The woody part is made up of pitted or scalariform vessels, accompanied by a few ligneous cells and separated by a parenchymatous tissue, agreeing with that of the bark. On addition of an alkali, sections of the root assume a bright yellow hue.

Chemical Composition—The mucilage in the dry root amounts to about 25 per cent. and the starch to as much more. The former appears from the not very accordant analysis of Schmidt and of Mulder to agree with the formula C₁₂H₂₀O₁₀, thus differing from the mucilage of gum arabic by one molecule less of water. It likewise differs in being precipitable by neutral acetate of lead. At the same time it does not show the behaviour of cellulose, as it does not turn blue by iodine when moistened with sulphuric acid, and it is not soluble in ammoniacal solution of oxide of copper.

The root also contains pectin and sugar (cane-sugar according to Wittstock), and a trace of fatty oil. Tannin is found in very small quantity in the outer bark alone.

In 1826 Bacon, a pharmacien of Caen, obtained from althæa root crystals of a substance at first regarded as peculiar, but subsequently identified with Asparagin, C₄H₈N₂O₃, H₂O. It had been previously prepared (1805) by Vauquelin and Robiquet from Asparagus, and is now known to be a widely diffused constituent of plants.[374] Marshmallow root does not yield more than 0·8 to 2·0 per cent. Asparagin crystallizes in large prisms or octohedra of the rhombic system; it is nearly tasteless, and appears destitute of physiological action. Its relation to succinic acid may be thus represented:—

Succinic acid: C₂H₄		COOH
		COOH;
Asparagin: C₂H₃(NH₂)		CONH₂
		COOH.

Asparagin is quite permanent whether in the solid state or dissolved, but it is easily decomposed if the solution contains the albuminoid constituents of the root, which act as a ferment. Leguminous seeds, yeast or decayed cheese induce the same change, the final product of which is succinate of ammonium, the asparagin taking the elements of water and hydrogen set free by the fermentation, thus—

Under the influence of acids or bases, or even by the prolonged boiling of its aqueous solution, asparagin is converted into Aspartate of Ammonium, C₄H₆(NH₄)NO₄, of which the hydrated asparagin contains the elements.

These transformations, especially the former, are undergone by the asparagin in the root, if the latter has been imperfectly dried, or has been kept long, or not very dry. Under such conditions, the asparagin gradually disappears, and the root then yields a brownish decoction, sometimes having a disagreeable odour of butyric acid. There is no doubt that a protein-substance here acts as a ferment. The sections of the root when touched with ammonia or caustic lye should display a bright yellow, not a dingy brown, colour.

The peeled root dried at 100° C. and incinerated afforded us 4·88 of ash, rich in phosphates.

Uses—Althæa is taken as a demulcent; it is sometimes also applied as an emollient poultice. It is far more largely used on the continent than in England.

FRUCTUS HIBISCI ESCULENTI.

Capsulæ Hibisci esculenti; Uëhka, Okro, Okra, Bendi-kai[375]; F. Gombo (in the French Colonies).

Botanical Origin—Hibiscus esculentus L. (Abelmoschus esculentus Guill. et Perr.) an herbaceous annual plant 2 to 3 or even 10 feet high, indigenous to the Old World.[376] It has been found growing abundantly wild on the White Nile by Schweinfurth, and also in 1861 by Col. Grant in Unyoro, 2° N. lat., near the lake Victoria Nyanza, where it is known to the natives as Bameea.

The plant is now largely cultivated in several varieties in all tropical countries.

History—The Spanish Moors appear to have been well acquainted with Hibiscus esculentus, which was known to them by the same name that it has in Persian at the present day—Bámiyah. Abul Abbas el-Nebáti, a native of Seville learned in plants, who visited Egypt in a.d. 1216, describes[377] in unmistakeable terms the form of the plant, its seeds and fruit, which last he remarks is eaten when young and tender with meat by the Egyptians. The plant was figured among Egyptian plants in 1592 by Prosper Alpinus,[378] who mentions its uses as an external emollient.

The powdered fruits as imported from Arabia Felix were known for some time (about the year 1848) in Europe as Nafé of the Arabs. They are noticed in the present work from the circumstance that they have a place in the Pharmacopœia of India.

Description—The fruit is a thin capsule, 4 to 6 or more inches long and about an inch in diameter, oblong, pointed, with 5 to 7 ridges corresponding to the valves and cells, each of which latter contains a single row of round seeds. It is covered with rough hairs and is green or purplish when fresh; it has a slightly sweet mucilaginous taste and a weak herbaceous odour. Like many other plants of the order, Hibiscus esculentus abounds in all its parts with insipid mucilage.

Microscopic Structure—A characteristic part for microscopic examination are the hairs of the fruit. They exhibit at the base one large cell, but their elongated and often slightly curved end is built up at a considerable number of small cells, without any solid contents. The middle and outer zone of the pericarp shows enormous holes filled up with colourless mucilage. In polarized light it is easily seen to be composed of successive layers.

Chemical Composition—It is probable that the fruits contain the same mucilage as Althæa, but we have had no opportunity of investigating the fact. Landrin[379] says it turns violet with iodine and yields no mucic acid when treated with nitric acid. Popp, who examined the green fruits in Egypt, states[380] that they abound in pectin, starch and mucilage. He found that when dried they afforded 2 to 2·4 per cent. of nitrogen, and an ash rich in salts of lime, potash and magnesia. The ripe seeds gave 2·4-2·5 per cent. of nitrogen; their ash 24 per cent. of phosphoric acid.

Uses—The fresh or dried, unripe fruits are used in tropical countries as a demulcent like marshmallow, or as an emollient poultice, for which latter purpose the leaves may also be employed. They are more important from an economic point of view, being much employed for thickening soups or eaten boiled as a vegetable. The root has been recommended as a substitute for that of Althæa.[381] The stems of the plant yield a good fibre.

STERCULIACEÆ.

OLEUM CACAO.

Butyrum Cacao, Oleum Theobromatis; Cacao Butter, Oil of Theobroma; F. Beurre de Cacao; G. Cacaobutter, Cacaotalg.

Botanical Origin—Cacao seeds (from which Cacao Butter is extracted) are furnished by Theobroma Cacao L., and apparently also by Th. leiocarpum Bernoulli, Th. pentagonum Bern., and Th. Salzmannianum Bern.[382] These trees are found in the northern parts of South America and in Central America as far as Mexico, both in a wild state and in cultivation.

History—Cacao seeds were first noticed by Capitan Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés (1514-1523), who stated[383] that they had been met with by Columbus, being used among the inhabitants of Yucatan instead of money. They were likewise pointed out to Charles V., by Cortes in one of his letters to the Emperor, dated Temixtitan, Sept. 3rd 1526.[384] The tree as well as the seeds and their uses, were at length described by Benzoni,[385] who lived in the new world from 1541 to 1555. Clusius figured the seeds in his “Notæ in Garciæ Aromatum historiam,” Antwerpiæ, 1582.

Cacao butter was prepared and described by Homberg[386] as early as 1695, at which time it appears to have had no particular application, but in 1719 it was recommended by D. de Quelus[387] both for ointments and as an aliment.

An essay published at Tübingen in 1735[388] called attention to it as “novum atque commendatissimum medicamentum.” A little later it is mentioned by Geoffroy[389] who says that it is obtained either by boiling or by expressing the seeds, that it is recommended as the basis of cosmetic pomades and as an application to chapped lips and nipples, and to hæmorrhoids.

Production—Cacao butter is procured for use in pharmacy from the manufacturers of chocolate, who obtain it by pressing the warmed seeds. These in the shelled state yield from 45 to 50 per cent. of oil. The natural seeds consist of about 12 per cent. of shell (testa) and 88 of kernels (cotyledons).

Description—At ordinary temperatures cacao butter is a light yellowish, opaque, dry substance, usually supplied in the form of oblong tablets having somewhat the aspect of white Windsor soap. Though unctuous to touch, it is brittle enough to break into fragments when struck, exhibiting a dull waxy fracture. It has a pleasant odour of chocolate, and melts in the mouth with a bland agreeable taste. Its sp. gr. is 0·961; its fusing point 20° to 30° C.

Examined under the microscope by polarized light, cacao butter is seen to consist of minute crystals. It is dissolved by 20 parts of boiling absolute alcohol, but on cooling separates to such an extent that the liquid retains not more than 1 per cent. in solution. The fat separated after refrigeration is found to have lost most of its chocolate flavour. Litmus is not altered by the hot alcoholic solution.

Cacao butter in small fragments is slowly dissolved by double its weight of benzol in the cold (10° C.), but by keeping partially separates in crystalline warts.

Chemical Composition—The fat under notice is composed, in common with others, of several bodies which by saponification furnish glycerin and fatty acids. Among the latter occurs also oleic acid,[390] contained in that part of the cacao butter which remains dissolved in cold alcohol as above stated. In fact by evaporating that solution a soft fat is obtained. But the chief constituents of cacao butter appear to be stearin, palmitin, and another compound of glycerin containing probably an acid of the same series richer in carbon,—perhaps arachic acid, C₂₀H₄₀O₂, or “theobromic acid” C₆₄H₁₂₈O₂, as suggested in 1877 by Kingzett.

Uses—Cacao butter, which is remarkable for having but little tendency to rancidity, has long been used in continental pharmacy; it was introduced into England a few years ago as a convenient basis for suppositories and pessaries.

Adulteration—The description given of the drug sufficiently indicates the means of ascertaining its purity.

LINEÆ.

SEMEN LINI.

Linseed, Flax Seed; F. Semence de Lin; G. Leinsamen, Flachssamen.>

Botanical Origin—Linum usitatissimum L., Common Flax, is an annual plant, native of the Old World, where it has been cultivated from the remotest times. It sows itself as a weed in tilled ground, and is now found in all temperate and tropical regions of the globe. Heer regards it as a variety evolved by cultivation from the perennial L. angustifolium Huds.

History—The history of flax, its textile fibre and seed, is intimately connected with that of human civilisation. The whole process of converting the plant into a fibre fit for weaving into cloth is frequently depicted on the wall-paintings of the Egyptian tombs.[391] The grave-clothes of the old Egyptians were made of flax, and the use of the fibre in Egypt may be traced back, according to Unger,[392] as far as the 23rd century b.c. The old literature of the Hebrews[393] and Greeks contains frequent reference to tissues of flax; and fabrics woven of flax have actually been discovered together with fruits and seeds of the plant in the remains of the ancient pile-dwellings bordering the lakes of Switzerland.[394]

The seed in ancient times played an important part in the alimentation of man. Among the Greeks, Alcman in the 7th century b.c., and the historian Thucydides, and among the Romans Pliny, mention linseed as employed for human food. The roasted seed is still eaten by the Abyssinians.[395]

Theophrastus expressly alludes to the mucilaginous and oily properties of the seed. Pliny and Dioscorides were acquainted with its medical application both external and internal. The latter, as well as Columella, exhaustively describes flax under its agricultural aspect. In an edict of the Emperor Diocletian De pretiis rerum venalium[396] dating a.d. 301, linseed is quoted 150 denarii, sesamé seed 200, hemp seed 80, and poppy seed 150, the modius castrensis, equal to about 880 cubic inches.[397] The propagation of flax in Northern Europe as of so many other useful plants was promoted by Charlemagne.[398] It seems to have reached Sweden and Norway before the 12th century.[399]

Description—The capsule which is globose splits into 5 carpels, each containing two seeds separated by a partition. The seeds are of flattened, elongated ovoid form with an acute edge, and a slightly oblique point blunt at one end. They have a brown, glossy, polished surface which under a lens is seen to be marked with extremely fine pits. The hilum occupies a slight hollow in the edge just below the apex. The testa which is not very hard encloses a thin layer of albumen surrounding a pair of large cotyledons having at their pointed extremity a straight embryo. The seeds of different countries vary from ¼ to ⅙ of an inch in length, those produced in warm regions being larger than those grown in cold. We find that 6 seeds of Sicilian linseed, 13 of Black Sea and 17 of Archangel linseed weigh respectively one grain.

When immersed in water, the seeds become surrounded by a thin, slippery, colourless, mucous envelope, which quickly dissolves as a neutral jelly, while the seed slightly swells and loses its polish. The seed when masticated has a mucilaginous oily taste.

Microscopic Structure—On examining the testa under almond oil or oil of turpentine, the outlines of the epidermal cells are not distinctly visible. But under dilute glycerin or in water the epidermis quickly swells up to 3 or 4 times its original thickness; on warming, the entire epidermis is resolved into mucilage, except a thin skeleton of cell-walls, which withstands even the action of caustic lye. The formation of the mucilage may be conveniently studied by the use of a solution of ferrous sulphate, with which thin sections of the testa should be moistened. Other structural peculiarities may be seen if they are imbued with concentrated sulphuric acid, washed and then moistened with a solution of iodine. The application of polarized light is also useful. By the latter means crystalloid granules of albuminoid matter become visible if the sections are examined under oil. The tissue of the albumen and the cotyledons abounds in drops of fatty oil.

Chemical Composition—The constituent of chief importance is the fixed oil which the seed contains to about ⅓ of its weight. The proportion obtained by pressure on a large scale is 20 to 30 per cent. varying with the quality of the seed. The oil when pressed without heat and when fresh has but little colour, is without unpleasant taste, and does not solidify till cooled to -20° C. The commercial oil however is dark yellow, and has a sharp repulsive taste and odour. On exposure to the air, especially after having been heated with oxide of lead, it quickly dries up to a transparent varnish consisting chiefly of Linoxyn, C₃₂H₅₄O₁₁. The crude oil increases in weight 11 to 12 per cent., although at the same time its glycerin is destroyed by oxidation.

By saponification, linseed oil yields glycerin, and 95 per cent. of fatty acids, consisting chiefly of Linoleic Acid, C₁₆H₂₆O₂, accompanied by some oleic, palmitic, and myristic acid. The action of the air transforms linoleic acid into the resinoid Oxylinoleic Acid, C₁₆H₂₆O₅. Linoleic acid appears to be contained in all drying oils, notably in that of poppy seed. It is not homologous either with ordinary fatty acids or with the oleic acid of oil of almonds, C₁₈H₃₄O₂. The chemistry of the drying oils, especially those of linseed and poppy, has been particularly investigated by Mulder.[400]

The viscid mucilage of linseed cannot be filtered till it has been boiled. It contains in the dry state more than 10 per cent. of mineral substances, when freed from which and dried at 110° C. it corresponds, like althæa-mucilage, to the formula C₁₂H₂₀O₁₀. The seeds by exhaustion with cold or warm water afford of it about 15 per cent. By boiling nitric acid it yields crystals of mucic acid; by dilute mineral acids it is broken up into dextrogyre gum and sugar and cellulose.[401]

Linseed contains about 4 per cent. of nitrogen corresponding to about 25 per cent. of protein-substances. After expression of the oil these substances remain in the cake so completely that the latter contains 5 per cent. of nitrogen, and constitutes a very important article for feeding cattle.

In the ripe state linseed is altogether destitute of starch, though this substance is found in the immature seed in the very cells which subsequently yield the mucilage. The latter may be regarded as in analogous cases to be a product of the transformation of starch.

The amount of water retained by the air-dry seed is about 9 per cent.

The mineral constituents of linseed, chiefly phosphates of potassium, magnesium, and calcium, amount on an average to 3 per cent., and pass into the mucilage. By treating thin slices of the testa and its adhering inner membrane with ferrous sulphate, it is seen that this integument is the seat of a small amount of tannin.

Production and Commerce—Flax is cultivated on the largest scale in Russia, from which country there was imported into the United Kingdom in 1872 linseed to the value of 3 millions sterling. The shipments were made in about equal proportion from the northern and the southern ports of Russia.

The imports from India in the same year amounted in value to £1,144,942, and from Germany and Holland to £144,108. The total import in 1872 was 1,514,947 quarters, value £4,513,842.

The cultivation of flax in Great Britain appears to be declining. The area under this crop in 1870 was 23,957 acres; in 1871, 17,366 acres; in 1872, 15,357 acres; and in 1873, 14,683 acres. The last named area reckoning the yield at 2 to 2½ quarters of seed per acre would represent a production of about 30,000 to 38,000 quarters.

In English price-currents, eight sorts of linseed are enumerated, namely, English, Calcutta, Bombay, Egyptian, Black Sea and Azof, Petersburg, Riga, Archangel. The first three appear to fetch the highest prices.

Uses—In medicine, linseed is chiefly used in the form of poultice which may be made either of the seed simply ground or of the pulverized cake. In either case the powder should not be long stored, as the oil in the comminuted seed is rapidly oxidized and fatty acids produced. An infusion of the seeds called Linseed Tea is a common popular demulcent remedy.

Adulteration—Linseed is very liable to adulteration with other seeds, especially when the commodity is scarce. The admixture in question is due in part to careless harvesting and in part to intentional additions. In 1864 the impure condition of the linseed shipped to the English market had become so detrimental to the trade that the importers and crushers founded an association called The Linseed Association of London, by which they bound themselves to refuse all linseed containing more than 4 per cent. of foreign seeds, and this step very rapidly improved the quality of the article.[402]

As the druggist has to purchase linseed meal, he must of necessity rely to some extent on the character of the oil-presser from whom he derives his supplies. The presence of the seeds of Cruciferæ (as rape and mustard) which is common, may be recognized by the pungent odour of the essential oil which they develope in contact with water. The introduction of cereals would also be easily discovered by iodine, which strikes no blue colour in a decoction of linseed. The microscope will also afford important aid in the examination of linseed cake or meal.

ZYGOPHYLLEÆ.

LIGNUM GUAIACI.

Lignum sanctum; Guaiacum Wood, Lignum Vitæ; F. Bois de Gaïac; G. Guaiakholz, Pockholz.

Botanical Origin—This wood is furnished by two West Indian species of Guaiacum, namely:—

1. G. officinale L., a middle-sized or low evergreen tree, with light blue flowers, parapinnate leaves having ovate, very obtuse leaflets in 2, less often in 3 pairs, and 2-celled fruits. It grows in Cuba, Jamaica (abundantly on the arid plains of the south side of the island), Les Gonaives in the N.W. of Hayti (plentiful), St. Domingo, Martinique, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, Trinidad, and the northern coast of the South American continent. This tree affords the Lignum Vitæ of Jamaica (of which very little is imported), a portion of that shipped from the ports of Hayti, and probably the small quantity exported by the United States of Colombia.

2. G. sanctum L., a tree much resembling the preceding, but distinguishable by its leaves having 3 to 4 pairs of leaflets which are very obliquely obovate or oblong, passing into rhomboid-ovate, and mucronulate; and a 5-celled fruit. It is found in Southern Florida, the Bahama Islands, Key West, Cuba, St. Domingo (including the part called Hayti) and Puerto Rico, and is certainly the source of the small but excellent Lignum Vitæ exported from the Bahamas as well as of some of that shipped from Hayti.

History—There can be no doubt but that the earliest importations of Lignum Vitæ were obtained from St. Domingo, of which island, Oviedo[403] who landed in America in 1514 mentions the tree, under the name of Guayacan, as a native. He points out its fruits as yellow and resembling two joined lupines, which could only be said with reference to G. officinale, and would not apply to the ovoid five-cornered fruits of G. sanctum. Oviedo appears however to have been aware of two species, one of which he found in Española (St. Domingo) as well as in Nagrando (Nicaragua) and the other in the island of St. John (Puerto Rico), whence it was called Lignum sanctum.

The first edition of Oviedo was printed in 1526; but some years before this the wood must have been known in Germany, as is evident by the treatises written in 1517, 1518, and 1519 by Nicolaus Poll,[404] Leonard Schmaus[405] and Ulrich von Hutten.[406] The last which gives a tolerable description of the tree, its wood, bark, and medicinal properties, was translated into English in 1533 by Thomas Paynel, canon of Merton Abbey, and published in London in 1536 under the title—“Of the wood called Guaiacum that healeth the Frenche Pockes and also helpeth the gout in the feete, the stoone, the palsey, lepree, dropsy, fallynge euyll, and other dyseases.” It was several times reprinted.

In the old pharmacy the products of destructive distillation of guaiacum wood were known as Oleum ligni sancti. It must have consisted of the substances which we mention further on in the following article.

Description—The wood (always known in commerce as Lignum Vitæ) as imported consists of pieces of the stem and thick branches, usually stripped of bark, and often weighing a hundredweight each. It is remarkably heavy and compact. Its sp. gr. which exceeds that of most woods is about 1·3.

Lignum Vitæ is mostly imported for turnery,[407] and the chips, raspings and shavings are the only form in which it is commonly seen in pharmacy. A stem 7 to 8 inches in diameter cut transversely exhibits a light-yellowish zone of sapwood about an inch wide, enclosing a sharply defined heartwood of a dark greenish brown. Both display alternate lighter and darker layers, which especially in the sapwood are further distinguished by groups of vessels. In this manner are formed a large number of circles resembling annual rings, the general form of which is evident, though the individual rings are by no means well defined. More than 20 such rings may be counted in the sapwood of a log such as we have mentioned, and more than 30 in the heartwood. The pithless centre is usually out of the axis. The medullary rays are not visible to the naked eye, but may be seen by a lens to be very numerous and equidistant. The pores of the heartwood may be distinguished as containing a brownish resin, while those of the outermost layer of sapwood are empty.

In the thickest pieces sapwood is wanting, and even in stems of about a foot in diameter it is reduced to ⅕ of an inch. It is of looser texture than the heartwood and floats on water, whereas the latter sinks. Both sapwood and heartwood owe their tenacity to an extremely peculiar zigzag arrangement[408] of the woody bundles. The sapwood is tasteless. The heartwood has a faintly aromatic and slightly irritating taste, and when heated or rubbed emits a weak agreeable odour.

The bark which was formerly officinal but is now almost obsolete, is very rich in oxalate of calcium and affords upon incineration not less than 23 per cent. of ash. It contains a resin distinct from that of the wood, and also a bitter acrid principle.[409]

The Lignum Vitæ of Jamaica (G. officinale) and that of the Bahamas (G. sanctum), of which authentic specimens have been kindly placed at our disposal by Mr. G. Shadbolt, display the same appearance as well as microscopic structure.[410]

Microscopic Structure—The wood consists for the most part of pointed, not very long, ligneous cells (libriform), traversed by one-celled rows of medullary rays. There are also thin layers of parenchymatous tissue, to which the zones apparent in a transverse section of the drug are due. The pitted vessels are comparatively large but not very numerous. The structure of the sapwood is the same as that of the heartwood, but in the latter the ligneous cells are filled with resin. The parenchymatous cells contain crystals of oxalate of calcium.

Chemical Composition—The only constituent of any interest is the resin which the heartwood contains to the extent of about a fourth of its weight. The sapwood afforded us 0·91 and the heartwood 0·60 per cent. of ash.

Commerce—Lignum Vitæ varies much in estimation, according to size, soundness, and the cylindrical form of the logs. The best is exported from the city of Santo Domingo, whither it is brought from the interior of the island. The quantity shipped from this port during 1871 was 1494 tons;[411] 220 tons were exported in 1877 from Puerto Plata on the northern coast of the island. The wood obtained from the Haytian ports (of the western part of the same island) is much less esteemed in the London market.

Some small wood of good quality comes from the Bahamas, and an ordinary quality, also small, from Jamaica. From the latter island, the quantity exported in 1871 was only 14 tons;[412] from the Bahamas in the same year 199 tons.[413] Lignum Vitæ was shipped from Santa Marta in 1872 to the extent of 115 tons.[414]

Hamburg is also an important place for the wood under notice; in 1877 there were imported 22,404 centners from S. Domingo and 3551 centners from Venezuela.

Uses—Guaiacum wood is only retained in the pharmacopœia as an ingredient of the Compound Decoction of Sarsaparilla. It is probably inert, at least in the manner in which it is now administered.[415]

Adulteration—In purchasing guaiacum chips it is necessary to observe that the non-resinous sapwood is absent, and still more that there is no admixture of any other wood. A spurious form of the drug seems to be by no means rare in the United States.[416]

RESINA GUAIACI.

Guaiacum Resin; F. Résine de Gaïac; G. Guaiakharz.

Botanical Origin—Guaiacum officinale L., [see preceding article.]

History—Hutten[417] in 1510 stated that guaiacum wood when set on fire exudes a blackish resin which quickly hardens, but of which he knew no use. The resin was in fact introduced into medicine much later than the wood. The first edition of the London Pharmacopœia in which we find the former named is that of 1677.

Production[418]—In the island of St. Domingo, whence the supplies of guaiacum resin are chiefly derived, the latter is collected from the stems of the trees, in part as a natural exudation, and in part as the result of incisions made in the bark. In some districts as in the island of Gonave near Port-au-Prince, another method of obtaining it is adopted. A log of the wood is supported in a horizontal position above the ground by two upright bars. Each end of the log is then set on fire, and a large incision having been previously made in the middle, the melted resin runs out therefrom in considerable abundance. 36,350 lbs. of it have been exported in 1875 from Port-au-Prince.

The resin is collected chiefly from G. officinale, which affords it in greater plenty than G. sanctum.

Description—The resin occurs in globular tears ½ an inch to 1 inch in diameter, but much more commonly in the form of large compact masses, containing fragments of wood and bark. The resin is brittle, breaking with a clean, glassy fracture; in thin pieces it is transparent and appears of a greenish brown hue. The powder when fresh is grey, but becomes green by exposure to light and air. It has a slight balsamic odour and but little taste, yet leaves an irritating sensation in the throat.

The resin has a sp. gr. of about 1·2. It fuses at 85° C., emitting a peculiar odour somewhat like that of benzoin. It is easily soluble in acetone, ether, alcohol, amylic alcohol, chloroform, creosote, caustic alkaline solutions, and oil of cloves; but is not dissolved or only partially by other volatile oils, benzol or bisulphide of carbon. By oxidizing agents it acquires a fine blue colour, well shown when a fresh alcoholic solution is allowed to dry up in a very thin layer and this is then sprinkled with a dilute alcoholic solution of ferric chloride. Reducing agents of all kinds, and heat produce decoloration. An alcoholic solution may be thus blued and decolorized several times in succession, but it loses at length its susceptibility. This remarkable property of guaiacum was utilized by Schönbein in his well-known researches on ozone.

Chemical Composition—The composition of guaiacum resin was ascertained by Hadelich (1862) to be as follows:—

If the mother-liquor obtained in the preparation of the potassium salt of guaiaretic acid (vide infra) is decomposed by hydrochloric acid, and the precipitate washed with water, ether will extract from the mass Guaiaconic Acid, a compound discovered by Hadelich, having the formula C₃₈H₄₀O₁₀. It is a light brown, amorphous substance, fusing at 100° C. It is without acid reaction but decomposes alkaline carbonates, forming uncrystallizable salts easily soluble in water or alcohol. It is insoluble in water, benzol, or bisulphide of carbon, but dissolves in ether, chloroform, acetic acid or alcohol. With oxidizing agents it acquires a transient blue tint.

Guaiaretic Acid, C₂₀H₂₆O₄, discovered by Hlasiwetz in 1859, may be extracted from the crude resin by alcoholic potash or by quicklime. With the former it produces a crystalline salt; with the latter an amorphous compound: from either the liquid, which contains chiefly a salt of guaiaconic acid, may be easily decanted. Guaiaretic acid is obtained by decomposing one of the salts referred to with hydrochloric acid, and crystallizing from alcohol. The crystals, which are soluble also in ether, benzol, chloroform, carbon bisulphide or acetic acid, but neither in ammonia nor in water, melt below 80° C., and may be volatilized without decomposition. The acid is not coloured blue by oxidizing agents.

By exhausting guaiacum resin with boiling bisulphide of carbon a slightly yellowish solution is obtained (containing chiefly guaiaretic acid?), which, on addition of concentrated sulphuric acid, turns beautifully red.

After the extraction of the guaiaconic acid there remains a substance insoluble in ether to which the name Guaiac Beta-resin has been applied. It dissolves in alcohol, acetic acid or alkalis, and is precipitated by ether, benzol, chloroform or carbon bisulphide in brown flocks, the composition of which appears not greatly to differ from that of guaiaconic acid.

Guaiacic Acid, C₁₂H₁₆O₆, obtained in 1841 by Thierry from guaiacum wood or from the resin, crystallizes in colourless needles. Hadelich was not able to obtain more than one part from 20,000 of guaiacum resin.

Hadelich’s Guaiac-yellow, the colouring matter of guaiacum resin, first observed by Pelletier, crystallizes in pale yellow quadratic octohedra, having a bitter taste. Like the other constituents of the resin, it is not a glucoside.

The decomposition-products of guaiacum are of peculiar interest. On subjecting the resin to dry distillation in an iron retort and rectifying the distillate, Guaiacene (Guajol of Völckel), C₅H₈O, passes over at 118° C. as a colourless neutral liquid having a burning aromatic taste.

At 205°-210° C., there pass over other products, Guaiacol, C₆H₄·OCH₃·OH, (methylic ether of pyrocatechin), and Kreosol C₆H₃·OH(CH₃)₂. Both are thickish, aromatic, colourless liquids, which become green by caustic alkalis, blue by alkaline earths, and are similar in their chemical relations to eugenic acid. Guaiacol has been prepared synthetically by Gorup-Besanez (1868) by combining iodide of methyl, CH₃I, with pyrocatechin, C₆H₄(OH)₂.

After the removal by distillation of the liquids just described, there sublime upon the further application of heat pearly crystals of Pyroguaiacin, C₃₈H₄₄O₆, an inodorous substance melting at 180° C. The same compound is obtained together with guaiacol by the dry distillation of guaiaretic acid. Pyroguaiacin is coloured green by ferric chloride, and blue by warm sulphuric acid. The similar reactions of the crude resin are probably due to this substance (Hlasiwetz).

Beautiful coloured reactions are likewise exhibited by two new acids which Hlasiwetz and Barth obtained (1864) in small quantity together with traces of fatty volatile acids, by melting purified resin of guaiacum with potassium hydrate. One of them is isomeric with pyrocatechuic acid.

Uses—Guaiacum resin is reputed diaphoretic and alterative. It is frequently prescribed in cases of gout and rheumatism.

Adulteration—The drug is sometimes imported in a very foul condition and largely contaminated with impurities arising from a careless method of collection.

RUTACEÆ.

CORTEX ANGOSTURÆ.

Cortex Cuspariæ; Angostura Bark, Cusparia Bark, Carony Bark; F. Ecorce d’Angusture de Colombie; G. Angostura-Rinde.

Botanical Origin—Galipea Cusparia St. Hilaire (G. officinalis Hancock, Bonplandia trifoliata Willd., Cusparia trifoliata Engler 1874, Flora Brasil. 113), a small tree, 12 to 15 feet high, with a trunk 3 to 5 inches in diameter, growing in abundance on the mountains of San Joaquin de Caroni in Venezuela, between 7° and 8° N. lat., also according to Bonpland[419] near Cumana. According to Hancock,[420] who was well acquainted with the tree, it is also found in the Missions of Tumeremo, Uri, Alta Gracia, and Cupapui, districts lying eastward of the Caroni and near its junction with the Orinoko. The bark is brought into commerce by way of Trinidad.

History—Angostura Bark is said to have been used in Madrid by Mutis as early as 1759[421] (the year before he left Spain for South America,) but it was certainly unknown to the rest of Europe until much later. Its real introducer was Brande, apothecary to Queen Charlotte, and father of the distinguished chemist of the same name, who drew attention to some parcels of the bark imported into England in 1788.[422] In the same year a quantity was sent to a London drug firm by Dr. Ewer of Trinidad, who describes it[423] as brought to that island from Angostura by the Spaniards. The drug continued to arrive in Europe either by way of Spain or England, and its use was gradually diffused. In South America it is known as Quina de Caroni and Cascarilla del Angostura.

Description—The bark occurs in flattish or channelled pieces, or in quills rarely as much as 6 inches in length and mostly shorter. The flatter pieces are an inch or more in width and ⅛ of an inch in thickness. The outer side of the bark is coated with a yellowish-grey corky layer, often soft enough to be removeable with the nail, and then displaying a dark brown, resinous under surface. The inner side is light brown with a rough, slightly exfoliating surface indicating close adhesion to the wood, strips of which are occasionally found attached to it; the obliquely cut edge also shows that it is not very easily detached. The bark has a short, resinous fracture, and displays on its transverse edge sharply defined white points, due to deposite of oxalate of calcium. It has a bitter taste and a nauseous musty odour.

Microscopic Structure—The most striking peculiarity is the great number of oil-cells scattered through the tissue of the bark. They are not much larger than the neighbouring parenchymatous cells, and are loaded with yellowish essential oil or small granules of resin. Numerous other cells contain bundles of needle-shaped crystals of oxalate of calcium or small starch granules. The liber exhibits bundles of yellow fibres, to which the foliaceous fracture of the inner bark is due. The structure of the bark under notice has been very minutely described and figured by Oberlin and Schlagdenhauffen.[424]

Chemical Composition—Angostura bark owes its peculiar odour to an essential oil which it was found by Herzog[425] to yield to the extent of ¾ per cent. It is probably a mixture of a hydrocarbon (C₁₀H₁₆) with an oxygenated oil. Its boiling point is 266° C. Oberlin and Schlagdenhauffen obtained 0·19 per cent. of the oil, and found it to be slightly dextrogyre; it assumes a fine red colour when shaken with aqueous ferric chloride, and turns yellow with concentrated sulphuric acid.

The bitter taste of the bark is attributed to a substance pointed out in 1833 by Saladin and named Cusparin. It is said to be crystalline, neutral, melting at 45° C., soluble in alcohol, sparingly in water, precipitable by tannic acid. The bark is stated to yield it to the extent of 1·3 per cent. Herzog endeavoured to prepare it but without success, nor have Oberlin and Schlagdenhauffen met with it. The latter chemists, on the other hand, isolated an alkaloid Angosturine C₁₀H₄₀NO₁₄. It is in thin prisms, melting at 85° and yielding a crystallized chlorhydrate or sulphate. Angosturine turns red when touched with concentrated sulphuric acid, or green if nitric acid or iodic acid, or other oxydizing substances, have been previously mixed with the sulphuric acid. The alcoholic solution of the alkaloid is of decidedly alkaline reaction. A cold aqueous infusion of angostura bark yields an abundant red-brown precipitate with ferric chloride. Thin slices of the bark are not coloured by solution of ferrous sulphate, so that tannin appears to be absent.

Uses—Angostura bark is a valuable tonic in dyspepsia, dysentery and chronic diarrhœa, but is falling into disuse.

Adulteration—About the year 1804, a quantity of a bark which proved to be that of Strychnos Nux Vomica reached Europe from India, and was mistaken for Cusparia. The error occasioned great alarm and some accidents, and the use of angostura was in some countries even prohibited. The means of distinguishing the two barks (which are not likely to be again confounded) are amply contained in the above-given descriptions and tests, and at length pointed out by Oberlin and Schlagdenhauffen. They also described the bark of Esenbeckia febrifuga Martius (Evodia febrifuga Saint Hilaire), a Brazilian tree belonging to the same natural order. Maisch[426] was the first to draw attention to this “new false Angostura bark.” It is at once distinguished by being devoid of aromatic properties; its taste is purely bitter.

FOLIA BUCHU.

Folia Buceo; Buchu, Bucchu, Bucha or Buka Leaves; F. Feuilles de Bucco; G. Bukublätter.

Botanical Origin—The Buchu leaves are afforded by three species of Barosma.[427] The latter are erect shrubs some feet in height, with glabrous rod-like branches, opposite leaves furnished with conspicuous oil-cells on the toothed margin as well as generally on the under surface. The younger twigs and several parts of the flower are also provided with oil-cells. The white flowers with 5-partite calyx, and the fruit formed of five erect carpels, are often found, together with small leafy twigs, in the drug of commerce.

The leaves of the three species referred to may be thus distinguished:—

1. Barosma crenulata Hook. (B. crenata Kunze).—Oblong, oval, or obovate, obtuse, narrowed towards the base into a distinct petiole; margin serrulate or crenulate; dimensions, ¾ to 1½ inches long, ³/₁₀ to ⁴/₁₀ of an inch wide.

2. B. serratifolia Willd.—Linear-lanceolate, equally narrowed towards either end, three-nerved, apex truncate always furnished with an oil-cell; margin sharply serrulate; 1-1½ inches long by about ²/₁₀ of an inch wide.

3. B. betulina Bartling.—Cuneate-obovate, apex recurved; margin sharply denticulate, teeth spreading; ½ to ¾ of an inch long by ³/₁₀ to ⁵/₁₀ wide. Substance of the leaf more harsh and rigid than in the preceding.

B. crenulata and B. betulina grow in the Divisions of Clanwilliam and Worcester, north and north-east of Cape Town, and the former even on Table Mountain close to the capital; B. serratifolia is found in the Division of Swellendam farther south.

History—The use of Buchu leaves was learnt from the Hottentots by the colonists of the Cape of Good Hope. The first importations of the drug were consigned to the house of Reece & Co., of London, who introduced it to the medical profession in 1821.[428] The species appears to have been B. crenulata.

Description—In addition to the characters already pointed out, we may observe that buchu leaves of either of the kinds mentioned are smooth and glabrous, of a dull yellowish-green hue, somewhat paler on the under side, on which oil-cells in considerable number are perceptible.

The leaves of B. crenulata vary in shape and size in different parcels, in some the leaves being larger and more elongated than in others, probably according to the luxuriance of the bushes in particular localities. Those of B. serratifolia and B. betulina present but little variation. Each kind is always imported by itself. Those of B. betulina are the least esteemed, and fetch a lower price than the others, yet appear to be quite as rich in essential oil.

Buchu leaves have a penetrating peculiar odour and a strongly aromatic taste.

Microscopic Structure—The essential oil is contained in large cells close beneath the epidermis of the under side of the leaf. The oil-cells are circular and surrounded by a thin layer of smaller cells; they consequently partake of the character of the oil-ducts in the aromatic roots of Umbelliferæ and Compositæ. The latter, however, are elongated.

The upper side of the leaf of Barosma exhibits an extremely interesting peculiarity[429]. There is a colourless layer of cells separating the epidermis from the green inner tissue (mesophyllum). If the leaves are examined under alcohol or almond oil the colourless layer is seen to be very narrow, and the thin walls of its cells shrunken and not clearly distinguishable. If the transverse sections are examined under water, these cells immediately swell up, and become strongly distended, giving off an abundance of mucilage, the latter being afforded by the solution of the very cell-walls. The mucilage of buchu leaves thus originates in the same way as in flax seed or quince seed, but in the former the epidermis is thrown off without alteration. We are not aware that other mucilaginous leaves possess a similar structure, at least not those of Althæa officinalis and of Sesamum which we examined[430].

Chemical Composition—The leaves of B. betulina afforded us by distillation 1·56 per cent, of volatile oil[431], which has the odour rather of peppermint than of buchu, and deviates the ray of polarized light considerably to the left. On exposure to cold it furnishes a camphor which, after re-solution in spirit of wine, crystallizes in needle-shaped forms. After repeated purification in this manner, the crystals of Barosma Camphor have an almost pure peppermint odour; they fuse at 85° C., and begin to sublime at 110° C. After fusion they again solidify only at 50° C. Submitted to elementary analysis, the crystals yielded us 74·08 per cent. of carbon and from 9 to 10 per cent. of hydrogen[432]. Barosma camphor is abundantly soluble in bisulphide of carbon.

The crude oil from which the camphor has been separated has a boiling point of about 200° C., quickly rising to 210° or even higher. That which distilled between these temperatures was treated with sodium, rectified in a current of common coal gas and submitted to elementary analysis, afforded us 77·86 per cent, of carbon and 10·58 of hydrogen. The formula C₁₀H₁₆O would require 78·94 of carbon and 10·53 of hydrogen.

Wayne’s experiments[433] appear to indicate that the oil also contains a substance capable of being converted into salicylic acid. An aqueous infusion of buchu leaves turns beautifully yellow if it is mixed with alkali.

On addition of perchloride of iron the infusion assumes a dingy brownish-green colour changing to red by an alkali. The infusion added to a concentrated solution of acetate of copper causes a yellow precipitate[434] which dissolves in caustic potash, affording a green solution. This may be due to the presence of a substance of the quercitrin or rutin class.

When the leaves are infused in warm water, the mucilage noticed under the microscope may easily be pressed out. It requires for precipitation a large amount of alcohol, being readily miscible with dilute alcohol. Neutral acetate of lead produces a yellow precipitate in an infusion of the leaves; the liquid affords a precipitate by a subsequent addition of basic acetate of lead. The latter precipitate is (probably) due to the mucilage, that afforded by neutral acetate partly to mucilage and partly, we suppose, to rutin or an allied substance. Yet the mucilage of buchu leaves is of the class which is not properly dissolved by water, but only swells up like tragacanth.

The leaves of B. crenulata afforded us upon incineration 4·7 per cent. of ash. Jones (1879) obtained on an average 4·54 per cent. from the same species; 5·27 from B. serratifolia; and 4·49 from B. betulina. He pointed out the presence of manganate in this ash.

The Diosmin of Landerer[435] is entirely unknown to us.

Commerce—The export of buchu from the Cape Colony in 1872 was 379,125 lb., about one-sixth of which quantity was shipped direct to the United States.[436]

Uses—Buchu is principally administered in disorders of the urino-genital organs. It is reputed diuretic and diaphoretic. In the Cape Colony the leaves are much employed as a popular stimulant and stomachic, infused in water, sherry, or brandy. They are also extensively used in the United States, both in regular medicine and by the vendors of secret remedies.

Substitutes—The leaves of Empleurum serrulatum Ait., a small shrub of the same order as Barosma and growing in the same localities, have been imported rather frequently of late and sold as Buchu. They have the same structure as regards mucilage, and nearly the same form as those of B. serratifolia, but are easily distinguished. They are still narrower, and often longer than those of B. serratifolia, devoid of lateral veins, and terminate in an acute point without an oil-duct. They have a bitterish taste and a less powerful odour than those of Barosma, even in fresh leaves as imported in London. The odour of Empleurum is moreover distinctly different from that of the leaves of Barosma. The flowers of Empleurum are still more distinct, for they are apetalous and reddish-brown. The fruit consisting of a single, compressed, oblong carpel, terminated by a flat-shaped horn, is quite unlike that of buchu.

The leaves of Barosma Eckloniana Berg (regarded by Sonder[437] as a form of B. crenulata) have to our knowledge been imported on one occasion (1873). They are nearly an inch long, oval, rounded at the base, strongly crenate, and grow from pubescent shoots.

We have seen other leaves which had been imported from South Africa and offered as buchu; but though probably derived from allied genera they were not to be mistaken for the genuine drug.

RADIX TODDALIÆ.

Botanical Origin—Toddalia aculeata Pers., a ramous prickly bush,[438] often climbing over the highest trees, common in the southern parts of the Indian peninsula as the Coromandel Coast, South Concans, and Canara, also found in Ceylon, Mauritius, the Indian Archipelago and Southern China.

History—The pungent aromatic properties which pervade the plant, but especially the fresh root-bark, are well known to the natives of India and have been utilized in their medical practice. They have also attracted the attention of Europeans, and the root of the plant is now recognized in the Pharmacopœia of India.

It is from this and other species of Toddalia, or from the allied genus Zanthoxylum,[439] that a drug is derived which under the name of Lopez Root had once some celebrity in Europe. This drug which was more precisely termed Radix Indica Lopeziana or Root of Juan Lopez Pigneiro, was first made known by the Italian physician Redi,[440] who described it in 1671 from specimens obtained by Pigneiro at the mouth of the river Zambesi in Eastern Africa,—the very locality in which in our times Toddalia lanceolata Lam. has been collected by Dr. Kirk.[441] It was actually introduced into European medicine by Gaubius[442] in 1771 as a remedy for diarrhœa, and acquired so much reputation that it was admitted to the Edinburgh Pharmacopœia of 1792. The root appears to have been sometimes imported from Goa, but its place of growth and botanical origin were entirely unknown, and it was always extremely rare andcostly.[443] It has long been obsolete in all countries except Holland, where until recently it was to be met with in the shops. The Pharmacopœia Neerlandica of 1851 says of it “Origo botanica perquam dubia—Patria Malacca?”

Description—The specimen of the root of Toddalia aculeata which we have examined was collected for us by Dr. G. Bidie of Madras whose statements regarding the stimulant and tonic action of the drug may be found in the Pharmacopœia of India, p. 442. It is a dense woody root in cylindrical, flexuous pieces, which have evidently been of considerable length and are from ½ to 1½ inches in diameter, covered with bark ⅒ to ¹/₁₂ of an inch in thickness. The bark has a soft, dull yellowish, suberous coat, wrinkled longitudinally, beneath which is a very thin layer of a bright yellow colour, and still lower and constituting two-thirds or more of the whole, is the firm, brown middle cortical layer and liber, which is the part chiefly possessing the characteristic pungency and bitterness of the drug. The yellow corky coat is however not devoid of bitterness. The wood is hard, of a pale yellow, and without taste and smell. The pores of the wood, which are rather large, are arranged in concentric order and traversed by numerous narrow medullary rays.

In a letter which Frappier[444] wrote to Guibourt from the island of Réunion where Toddalia aculeata is very common, he states that the roots of the plant are of enormous length (longueur incroyable) and rather difficult to get out of the basaltic rock into the fissures of which they penetrate. Mr. J. Horne of the Botanical Garden, Mauritius, has sent us a specimen of the root of this plant, the bark of which is of a dusky brown, with the suberous layer but little developed.

Microscopic Structure—We have examined the root for which we are indebted to Dr. Bidie, and may state that its cortical tissue is remarkable by the number of large cells filled with resin and essential oil; they are scattered through the whole tissue, the cork excepted. The parenchymatous cells are loaded with small starch granules or with crystals of oxalate of calcium. The vessels of younger roots abound in yellow resin.

Chemical Composition—None of the constituents of the Toddalia root of India have yet been satisfactorily examined. The bark contains an essential oil, which would be better extracted from fresh than from dry material. The tissue of the bark is but little coloured by salts of iron. In the aqueous infusion, tannic acid produces an abundant precipitate, probably of an indifferent bitter principle rather than of an alkaloid. We have been unable to detect the presence in the bark of berberine.

Lopez root was examined in Wittstein’s laboratory by Schnitzer[445] who found that the bark contains in addition to the usual substances a large proportion of resin,—a mixture probably of two or three different bodies. The essential oil afforded by the bark had an odour resembling cinnamon and melissa.

Uses—The drug has been introduced into the Pharmacopœia of India chiefly upon the recommendation of Dr. Bidie of Madras, who considers it of great value as a stimulating tonic. The bark rasped or shaved from the woody root is the only part that should be used.

FOLIA PILOCARPI.

Folia Jaborandi.

Botanical Origin—Pilocarpus pennatifolius[446] Lemaire, a slightly branched shrub, attaining about 10 feet in height. It is distributed through the eastern provinces of Brazil.

Pilocarpus Selloanus[447] Engler, occurring in Southern Brazil and Paraguay, appears to be not considerably different from P. pennatifolius.

History—Piso[448] recommended an infusion made with Ipecacuanha and Jaborandi. Plumier,[449] who also mentioned this, figured under the name of Jaborandi two plants of the order Piperaceæ. The introduction of the leaves of Pilocarpus pennatifolius into medical use is due to Dr. Coutinho of Pernambuco, 1874. The plant has been cultivated in European greenhouses since about the year 1847; we have repeatedly seen it flowering at Strassburg. Baillon in 1875 showed the fragments of Jaborandi as supplied by Coutinho to belong to P. pennatifolius, which had been described in 1852 by Lemaire. Holmes (1875) in examining the drug as imported from Pernambuco came to the same conclusion.

Description—The leaves of the species under examination are long-stalked, imparipennate, the opposite leaflets in 2 to 5, in cultivated plants most commonly in 2 pairs, the terminal one longer stalked, while the others are provided with a petiole attaining 1½ inch in length or remaining much shorter. The whole leaf is frequently 1½ feet long, the leaflets being often as much as 5 inches long by 2 inches wide. The latter are entire oblong, tapering or rounded at the base, tapering or obtuse or even emarginate at the apex. The leaflets are coriaceous, with a slightly revolute margin and a prominent midrib below. In transmitted light they show very numerous pellucid oil-glands.

The taste of the leaves of Pilocarpus is at first bitterish and aromatic; they subsequently produce a tingling sensation in the mouth and an abundant flow of saliva.

Microscopic Structure[450]—The oil-glands consist of large cells of the same structure as those occurring generally in the leaves of Rutaceæ, Aurantiaceæ, Myrtaceæ. In Pilocarpus they are largely distributed in the tissue covered on both sides of the leaf by the epidermis; the oil-cells are also abundantly met with in the petiole and in the bark of the stems and branches.

Chemical Composition—The active principle of Jaborandi is the alkaloid Pilocarpine, C₂₃H₃₅N₄O₄ + 4OH₂, discovered in 1875 by Hardy. It is an amorphous soft mass, but yielding crystallized salts, among which the hydrochlorate and the nitrate are now more frequently used than the drug itself. The leaves afford about ½ per cent. of the nitrate.

The occurrence of another peculiar alkaloid in Pilocarpus has been asserted, but not ultimately proved.

The leaves contain about ½ per cent. of essential oil, the prevailing constituent of it being a dextrogyrate terpene, C₁₀H₁₆, boiling at 178°, which forms a crystallized compound C₁₀H₁₆ + 2HCl melting at 49°·5 C.

Uses—Pilocarpine being a powerful diaphoretic and sialagogue, the leaves of Jaborandi are used to some extent in pharmaceutical preparations.

Other Kinds of Jaborandi—This name, as above stated, has originally been given to plants of the order Piperaceæ, some of which are still known in Brazil under the name Jaborandi. The following may be quoted as being used at least in that country: Serronia Jaborandi[451] Gaudichaud, Piper reticulatum L. (Enckea Miquel), Piper citrifolium Lamarck (Steffensia Kunth), Piper nodulosum Link, Artanthe mollicoma Miq.

Aubletia trifolia[452] Richard (Monniera L.) and Xanthoxylum elegans Engler, belonging to the same order as Pilocarpus itself, are also sometimes called Jaborandi.

We are not aware that other leaves than those of Pilocarpus are imported to some extent in Europe under the name of Jaborandi.

AURANTIACEÆ.

FRUCTUS LIMONIS.

Lemon; F. Citron, Limon; G. Citrone, Limone.

Botanical Origin—Citrus Limonum Risso (C. Medica var. β Linn.), a small tree 10 to 15 feet in height, planted here and there in gardens in many subtropical countries, but cultivated as an object of industry on the Mediterranean coast between Nice and Genoa, in Calabria, Sicily, Spain, and Portugal.

The tree which is supposed to represent the wild state of the lemon and lime, and as it seems to us after the examination of numerous specimens in the herbarium of Kew, of the citron (Citrus Medica Risso) also, is a native of the forests of Northern India, where it occurs in the valleys of Kumaon and Sikkim.

The cultivated lemon-tree is of rather irregular growth, with foliage somewhat pallid, sparse, and uneven, not forming the fine, close head of deep green that is so striking in the orange tree. The young shoots are of a dull purple; the flowers, which are produced all the year except during the winter, and are in part hermaphrodite and in part unisexual, have the corolla externally purplish; internally white, and a delicate aroma distinct from that of orange blossom. The fruit is pale yellow, ovoid, usually crowned by a nipple.

History—The name of the lemon in Sanskrit is Nimbuka; in Hindustani, Limbu, Limu, or Ninbu. It is probably originally a Cashmere word, which was transferred to the Sanskrit in comparatively modern times, not in the antiquity.[453] From these sounds the Arabians formed the word Limun, which has passed into the languages of Europe.

The lemon was unknown to the inhabitants of ancient Greece and Rome; but it is mentioned in the Book of Nabathæan Agriculture,[454] which is supposed to date from the 3rd or 4th century of our era. The introduction of the tree to Europe is due to the Arabians, yet at what precise period is somewhat doubtful. Arance and Limone are mentioned by an Arabic poet living in the 11th century, in Sicily, quoted by Falcando.[455] The geographer Edrisi,[456] who resided at the court of Roger II., king of Sicily, in the middle of the 12th century, mentions the lemon (limouna) as a very sour fruit of the size of an apple which was one of the productions of Mansouria on the Mahrân or Indus; and he speaks of it in a manner that leads one to infer it was not then known in Europe. This is the more probable from the fact that there is no mention either of lemon or orange in a letter written a.d. 1239 concerning the cultivation of the lands of the Emperor Frederick II. at Palermo,[457] a locality in which these fruits are now produced in large quantity.

On the other hand the lemon is noticed at great length by Ibn Baytar of Malaga, who flourished in the first half of the 13th century, but of its cultivation in Spain at that period there is no actual mention.[458] In 1369 at least citron trees, “arbores citronorum,” were planted in Genoa,[459] and there is evidence that also the lemon-tree was grown on the Riviera di Ponente about the middle of the 15th century, since Limones and also Citri are mentioned in the manuscript Livre d’Administration of the city of Savona, under date 1486.[460] The lemon was cultivated as early as 1494 in the Azores, whence the fruit used to be largely shipped to England; but since the year 1838 the exportation has totally ceased.[461]

Description—The fruit of Citrus Limonum as found in the shops[462] is from about 2 to 4 inches in length, egg-shaped with a nipple more or less prominent at the apex; its surface, of a pale yellow, is even or rugged, covered with a polished epidermis. The parenchyme within the latter abounds in large cells filled with fragrant essential oil. The roughness of the surface of the rind is due to the oil-cells. The peel, which varies considerably in thickness but is never so thick as that of the citron, is internally white and fibrous, and is adherent to the pale yellow pulp. The latter is divided into 10 or 12 segments each containing 2 or 3 seeds. It abounds in a pale yellow acid juice having a pleasant sour taste and a slight peculiar odour quite distinct from that of the peel. When removed from the pulp by pressure, the juice appears as a rather turbid yellowish fluid having a sp. gr. which varies from 1·040 to 1·045, and containing in each fluid ounce from 40 to 46 grains of citric acid, or about 9½ per cent.[463] In Italy all the fine and perfect fruit is exported; the windfalls and the damaged fruit are used for the production of the essential oil and the juice. About 13,000 lemons of this kind yield one pipe (108 gallons) of raw juice. Sicilian juice in November will contain about 9 ounces of citric acid per gallon, but 6 ounces when afforded by the fruit collected in April. The juice is boiled down in copper vessels, over an open fire, till its specific gravity is about 1·239.[464] Lemon juice (Succus limonis) for administration as a medicine should be pressed as wanted from the recent fruit whenever the latter is obtainable.

The peel (Cortex limonis) cut in somewhat thin ribbons from the fresh fruit is used in pharmacy, and is far preferable to that sold in a dried state.

Microscopic Structure of the Peel.—The epidermis exhibits numerous stomata; the parenchyme of the pericarp encloses large oil-cells, surrounded by small tabular cells. The inner spongy tissue is built up of very remarkable branched cells, separated by large intercellular spaces. A solution of iodine in iodide of potassium imparts to the cell-walls a transient blue coloration. The outer layers of the parenchymatous tissue contain numerous yellowish lumps of a substance which assumes a brownish hue by iodine, and yields a yellow solution if potash be added. Alkaline tartrate of copper is reduced by this substance, which probably consists of hesperidin. There also occur large crystals of oxalate of calcium, belonging to the monoclinic system. The interior tissue is irregularly traversed by small vascular bundles.

Chemical Composition—The peel of the lemon abounds in essential oil, which is a distinct article of commerce, and will be described hereafter.

Lemons, as well as other fruits of the genus Citrus, contain a bitter principle, Hesperidin, of which E. Hoffmann[465] obtained 5 to 8 per cent. from unripe bitter oranges. He extracted them with dilute alcohol, after they had previously been exhausted by cold water. The alcohol should contain about 1 per cent. of caustic potash; the liquid on cooling is acidulated with hydrochloric acid, when it yields a yellowish crystalline deposit of hesperidin, which may be obtained colourless and tasteless by recrystallization from boiling alcohol. By dilute sulphuric acid (1 per cent.) hesperidin is broken up as follows:—

Hesperidin is very little soluble even in boiling water or in ether, but dissolves readily in hot acetic acid, also in alkaline solutions, the latter then turning soon yellow and reddish. Pure hesperidin, as presented to one of us by Hoffmann, darkens when it is shaken with alcoholic perchloride of iron, and turns dingy blackish brown when gently warmed with the latter.

Hesperetin forms crystals melting at 223° C., soluble both in alcohol or ether, not in water; they taste sweet. They are split up by potash in Phloroglucin and Hesperetic acid, C₁₀H₁₀O₄.

On addition of ferric chloride, thin slices of the peel are darkened, owing probably to some derivative of hesperidin, or to hesperidin itself.

The name hesperidin had also been applied to yellow crystals extracted from the shaddock, Citrus decumana L., the dried flowers of which afford about 2 per cent. of that substance. It is, as shown in 1879 by E. Hoffmann, quite different from hesperidin as described above; he calls it Naringin and assigns to it the formula C₂₃H₂₆O₁₂+4OH₂. Naringin is readily soluble in hot water or in alcohol, not in ether or chloroform. Its solutions turn brown-red on addition of ferric chloride.

Lemon juice, some of the characters of which have been already noticed, is an important article in a dietetic point of view, being largely consumed on shipboard for the prevention of scurvy. In addition to citric acid it contains 3 to 4 per cent. of gum and sugar, and 2·28 per cent. of inorganic salts, of which according to Stoddart only a minute proportion is potash. Cossa[466] on the other hand, who has recently studied the products of the lemon tree with much care, has found that the ash of dried lemon juice contains 54 per cent. of potash, besides 15 per cent. of phosphoric acid.

Stoddart has pointed out the remarkable tendency of citric acid to undergo decomposition,[467] and has proved that in lemons kept from February to July this acid generally decreases in quantity, at first slowly, but afterwards rapidly, until at the end of the period it entirely ceases to exist, having been all split up into glucose and carbonic acid. At the same time the sp. gr. of the juice was found to have undergone but slight diminution:—thus it was 1·044 in February, 1·041 in May, and 1·027 in July, and the fruit had hardly altered in appearance. Lemon juice may with some precautions be kept unimpaired for months or even years. Yet it is capable of undergoing fermentation by reason of the sugar, gum, and albuminoid matters which it contains.

Commerce—Lemons are chiefly imported from Sicily, to a smaller extent from the Riviera of Genoa and from Spain. From the published statistics of trade, in which lemons are classed together with oranges under one head, it appears that these fruits are being imported in increasing quantities. The value of the shipments to the United Kingdom in 1872 (largely exceeding those of any previous year) was £1,154,270. Of this sum, £986,796 represents the value of the oranges and lemons imported from Spain, Portugal, the Canary Islands and Azores; £155,330 the shipments of the same fruit from Italy; and £3,825 those from Malta.

Of concentrated lemon juice there were exported in 1877 from Messina 1,631,332 kilogrammes, valued at 2,446,996 lire. The value of concentrated lime juice exported in 1874 from Montserrat was £3,390. From Dominica, 11,285 gallons, value £1,825, were shipped in 1875.

Uses—Lemon peel is used in medicine solely as a flavouring ingredient. Freshly prepared lemon juice is often administered with an alkaline bicarbonate in the form of an effervescing draught, or in a free state.

Concentrated lemon juice is imported for the purpose of making citric acid; it is derived not only from the lemon, but also, to a smaller extent, from the lime and bergamot. Lime juice of the West Indies is chiefly used as a beverage; small quantities of it are also exported for the manufacture of citric acid. The culture of Citrus Limetta Risso, the lime, was introduced in Montserrat in 1852.

OLEUM LIMONIS.

Oleum Limonum; Essential Oil or Essence of Lemon; F. Essence de Citron; G. Citronenöl.

Botanical Origin—Citrus Limonum Risso ([see p. 114]).

History—The chemists of the 16th century were well acquainted with the method of extracting essential oils by distillation. Besson in his work L’art et moyen parfaict de tirer huyles et eaux de tous medicaments simples et oleogineux, published at Paris in 1571, mentions lemon-(citron) and orange-peel among the substances subjected to this process. Giovanni Battista Porta,[468] a learned Neapolitan writer, describes the method of preparing Oleum ex corticibus Citri to consist in removing the peel of the fruit with a rasp and distilling it so comminuted with water; and adds that the oils of lemon and orange may be obtained in the same manner. Essence of lemon of two kinds, namely expressed and distilled, was sold in Paris in the time of Pomet, 1692.

Production—Essential oil of lemon is manufactured in Sicily, at Reggio in Calabria, and at Mentone and Nice in France.

The lemons are used while still rather green and unripe, as being richer in oil than when quite mature. Only the small and irregular fruit, such as is not worth exporting, is employed for affording the essence.

The process followed in Sicily and Calabria may be thus described;[469] it is performed in the months of November and December.

The workman first cuts off the peel in three thick longitudinal slices, leaving the central pulp of a three-cornered shape with a little peel at either end. This central pulp he cuts transversely in the middle, throwing it on one side and the pieces of peel on the other. The latter are allowed to remain till the next day and are then treated thus: the workman seated holds in the palm of his left hand a flattish piece of sponge, wrapping it round his forefinger. With the other he places on the sponge one of the slices of peel, the outer surface downwards, and then presses the zest-side (which is uppermost) so as to give it for the moment a convex instead of a concave form. The vesicles are thus ruptured, and the oil which issues from them is received in the sponge with which they are in contact. Four or five squeezes are all the workman gives to each slice of peel, which done he throws it aside. Though each bit of peel has attached to it a small portion of pulp, the workman contrives to avoid pressing the latter. As the sponge gets saturated the workman wrings it forcibly, receiving its contents in a coarse earthen bowl provided with a spout; in this rude vessel, which is capable of holding at least three pints, the oil separates from the watery liquid which accompanies it and is then decanted.

The yield is stated to be very variable, 400 fruits affording 9 to 14 ounces of essence. The prisms of pulp and the exhausted pieces of peel are submitted to pressure in order to extract from them lemon juice, and are said to be also subjected to distillation. The foregoing is termed the sponge-process; it is also applied to the orange. It appears rude and wasteful, but when honestly performed it yields an excellent product.

Essence of lemon is prepared at Mentone and Nice by a different method. The object being to set free and to collect the oil contained in the vesicles of the peel, an apparatus is employed, which may be thus described:—a stout saucer or shallow basin of pewter, about 8½ inches in diameter with a lip on one side for convenience of pouring. Fixed in the bottom of this saucer are a number of stout, sharp, brass pins, standing up about half an inch; the centre of the bottom is deepened into a tube about an inch in diameter and five inches in length, closed at its lower end. This vessel, which is called an écuelle à piquer, has therefore some resemblance to a shallow, dish-shaped funnel, the tube of which is closed below.

The workman takes a lemon in the hand, and rubs it over the sharp pins, turning it round so that the oil-vessels of the entire surface may be punctured. The essential oil which is thus liberated is received in the saucer whence it flows down into the tube; and as this latter becomes filled, it is poured into another vessel that it may separate from the turbid aqueous liquid that accompanies it. It is finally filtered and is then known as Essence de Citron au zeste. A small additional produce is sometimes obtained by immersing the scarified lemons in warm water and separating the oil which floats off.

A second kind of essence termed Essence de Citron distillée is obtained by rubbing the surface of fresh lemons, or of those which have been submitted to the process just described, on a coarse grater of tinned iron, by which the portion of peel richest in essential oil is removed. This grated peel is subjected to distillation with water, and yields a colourless essence of very inferior fragrance, which is sold at a low price.

Description[470]—The oil obtained by the sponge-process and that of the écuelle à piquer are mobile liquids of a faint yellow colour, of exquisite fragrance and bitterish aromatic taste.

The different specimens which we have examined are readily miscible with bisulphide of carbon, but dissolve sparingly in spirit of wine (0·830). An equal weight of the oil and of spirit of wine forms a turbid mixture. No peculiar coloration is produced by mixture with perchloride of iron.

The oils are dextrogyre, but differ in their rotatory power, as may be illustrated by the following results, which we obtained by examining them in a column 50 millimetres long in the polaristrobometer of Wild. The oil of Signori Panuccio, due to the sponge-process ([p. 118, note 2]), deviated 20·9°, that of Monsieur Médecin (Essence de Citron au zeste) obtained by the éculle à piquer deviated 33·4° and his distilled oil 28·3°.

Chemical Composition—The prevailing portion of most essential oils of the Aurantiaceæ agrees with the formula C₁₀H₁₆; the differences which they exhibit chiefly concern their optical properties, odour, and colour. The boiling point mostly varies from about 170° to 180° C., the sp. gr. between 0·83 and 0·88. These oils are a mixture of isomeric hydrocarbons, and also contain a small amount of cymene, C₁₀H₁₄, and of oxygenated oils, not yet well known; of these we may infer the presence either from analytical results or simply from the fact that the crude oils are altered by metallic sodium. If they are purified by repeated rectification over that metal, they are finally no longer altered by it. Oils thus purified cease to possess their original fragrance, and often resemble oil of turpentine, with which they agree in composition and general chemical behaviour.

As to essential oil of lemons, its chief constituent is the terpene, C₁₀H₁₆, which, like oil of turpentine, easily yields crystals of terpin, C₁₀H₁₆ 3OH₂. There is further present, according to Tilden (1879) another hydrocarbon, C₁₀H₁₆, which already boils at 160° C., whereas the foregoing boils at 176° C. Lastly a small amount of cymene and of a compound acetic ether, C₂H₃O(C₁₀H₁₇O), would appear to occur also in oil of lemons. The crude oil of lemons already yields the crystalline compound C₁₀H₁₆ + 2HCl, when saturated with anhydrous hydrochloric gas, whereas by the same treatment oil of turpentine affords the solid compound C₁₀H₁₆ + HCl.

Essential oil of lemons (not the distilled) when long kept deposits a greasy mass, from which we have obtained small crystals apparently of Bergaptene ([p. 123]).

Commerce—Essence of lemons is shipped chiefly from Messina and Palermo, packed in copper bottles called in Italian ramiere and by English druggists “jars” holding 25 to 50 kilo. or more; sometimes in tin bottles of smaller size. The quantity of essences of lemon, orange and bergamot exported from Sicily in 1871 was 368,800 lb., valued at £144,520, of which about two-thirds were shipped to England.[471] In 1877 the export of these essential oils from Messina amounted to 306,948 kilogrammes, valued at 6,130,960 lire.

Uses—Essence of lemon is used in perfumery, and as a flavouring ingredient; and though much sold by druggists is scarcely employed in medicine.

Adulteration—Few drugs are more rarely to be found in a state of purity than essence of lemon. In fact it is stated that almost all that comes into the market is more or less diluted with oil of turpentine or with the cheaper distilled oil of lemons. Manufacturers of the essence complain that the demand for a cheap article forces them to this falsification of their product.

OLEUM BERGAMOTTÆ.

Oleum Bergamii; Essence or Essential Oil of Bergamot; F. Essence de Bergamotte; G. Bergamottöl.

Botanical Origin—Citrus Bergamia var. vulgaris Risso et Poiteau,[472] a small tree closely resembling in flowers and foliage the Bitter Orange. Its fruit is 2½ to 3 inches in diameter, nearly spherical, or slightly pear-shaped, frequently crowned by the persistent style; it is of a pale golden yellow like a lemon,[473] with the peel smooth and thin, abounding in essential oil of a peculiar fragrance; the pulp is pale yellowish green, of a bitterish taste, and far less acid than that of the lemon.

The tree is cultivated at Reggio in Calabria, and is unknown in a wild state.

History—The bergamot is one of the cultivated forms which abound in the genus Citrus, and which constitute the innumerable varieties of the orange, lemon and citron. Whether it is most nearly related to the lemon or to the orange is a point discussed as early as the beginning of the last century. Gallesio[474] remarks that it so evidently combines the characters of the two that it should be regarded as a hybrid between them. The bergamot first appeared in the latter part of the 17th century. It is not mentioned in the grand work on orange trees of Ferrari,[475] published at Rome in 1646, nor in the treatise of Commelyn[476] (1676), nor in the writings of Lanzoni (1690),[477] or La Quintinie (1692).[478] So far as we know, it is first noticed in a little book called Le Parfumeur François, printed at Lyons in 1693. The author who calls himself Le Sieur Barbe, parfumeur, says that the Essence de Cedra ou Bergamotte is obtained from the fruits of a lemon-tree which has been grafted on the stem of a bergamot pear; he adds that it is got by squeezing small bits of the peel with the fingers in a bottle or globe large enough to allow the hand to enter.

Volkamer of Nuremberg, who produced a fine work on the Citron tribe in 1708, has a chapter on the Limon Bergamotta, which he describes as gloria limonum et fructus inter omnes nobilissimus. He states that the Italians prepare from it the finest essences, which are sold at a high price.[479]

But, as shown by one of us,[480] the essential oil of bergamot had already, in 1688, a place among the stores of an apothecary of the German town of Giessen.

The name Bergamotta was originally applied to a large kind of pear, called in Turkish “beg-ârmûdî,” i.e. prince’s pear.[481]

Production—The bergamot is cultivated at Reggio, on low ground near the sea, and in the adjacent villages. The trees are often intermixed with lemon and orange trees, and the soil is well irrigated and cropped with vegetables.

The essential oil (Oleum Bergamottæ) is obtained from the full-grown but still unripe and more or less green fruits, gathered in the months of November and December. They are richer in oil than any one of the allied fruits. It was formerly made like that of lemon by the sponge-process, but during the last 20 years this method has been generally superseded by the introduction of a special machine for the extraction of the essential oil. In this machine the fruits are placed in a strong, saucer-like, metallic dish, about 10 inches in diameter, having in the centre a raised opening which with the outer edge forms a broad groove or channel; the dish is fitted with a cover of similar form. The inner surface both of the dish and cover is rendered rough by a series of narrow, radiating metal ridges of blades which are about ¼ of an inch high and resemble the backs of knifes. The dish is also furnished with some small openings to allow of the outflow of essential oil; and both dish and cover are arranged in a metallic cylinder, placed over a vessel to receive the oil. By a simple arrangement of cog-wheels moved by a handle, the cover, which is very heavy, is made to revolve rapidly over the dish, and the fruit lying in the groove between the two is carried round, and at the same time is subjected to the action of the sharp ridges, which, rupturing the oil-vessels, cause the essence to escape, and set it free to flow out by the small openings in the bottom of the dish. The fruits are placed in the machine, 6, 8, or more at a time, according to their size, and subjected to the rotatory action above described for about half a minute, when the machine is stopped, they are removed, and fresh ones substituted. About 7,000 fruits can thus be worked in one of these machines in a day. The yield of oil is said to be similar to that of lemon, namely 2½ to 3 ounces from 100 fruits.

Essence of bergamot made by the machine is of a greener tint than that obtained by the old sponge-process. During some weeks after extraction it gradually deposits a quantity of white greasy matter (bergaptene), which, after having been exhausted as much as possible by pressure, is finally subjected to distillation with water in order to separate the essential oil it still contains.

The fruits from which the essence has been extracted are submitted to pressure, and the juice, which is much inferior in acidity to lemon juice, is concentrated and sold for the manufacture of citric acid. Finally, the residue from which both essence and juice have been removed, is consumed as food by oxen.

Description[482]—Essential oil of bergamot is a thin and mobile fluid of peculiar and very fragrant odour, bitterish taste, and slightly acid reaction. It has a pale greenish yellow tint, due to traces of chlorophyll, as may be shown by the spectroscope. Its sp. gr. is 0·86 to 0·88; its boiling point varies from 183° to 195° C.

The oil is miscible with spirit of wine (0·83 sp. gr.), absolute alcohol, as well as with crystallizable acetic acid. Four parts dissolve clearly one part of bisulphide of carbon, but the solution becomes turbid if a larger proportion of the latter is added. Bisulphide of carbon itself is incapable of dissolving clearly any appreciable quantity of the oil. A mixture of 10 drops of the oil, 50 drops of bisulphide of carbon and one of strong sulphuric acid has an intense yellow hue. Perchloride of iron imparts to bergamot oil dissolved in alcohol a dingy brown colour.

Panuccio’s oil of bergamot examined in the same way as that of lemon ([p. 120]) deviates 7° to the right, and has therefore a dextrogyre power very inferior to that of other oils of the same class.[483] But it probably varies in this respect, for commercial specimens which we judged to be of good quality deviated from 6·8° to 10·4° to the right.

Chemical Composition—If essential oil of bergamot is submitted to rectification, the portions that successively distill over do not accord in rotatory power or in boiling point, a fact which proves it to be a mixture of several oils, as is further confirmed by analysis. It appears to consist of hydrocarbons, C₁₀H₁₆, and their hydrates, neither of which have as yet been satisfactorily isolated. Oil of bergamot, like that of turpentine, yields crystals of the composition C₁₀H₁₆ + 3H₂O, if 8 parts are allowed to stand some weeks with 1 part of spirit of wine, 2 of nitric acid (sp. gr. 1·2) and 10 of water, the mixture being frequently shaken. No solid compound is produced by saturating the oil with anhydrous hydrochloric gas.

The greasy matter that is deposited from oil of bergamot soon after its extraction, and in small quantity is often noticeable in that of commerce, is called Bergaptene or Bergamot Camphor. We have obtained it in fine, white, acicular crystals, neutral and inodorous, by repeated solution in spirit of wine. Its composition according to the analysis of Mulder (1837) and of Ohme (1839) answers to the formula C₉H₆O₃, which in our opinion requires further investigation. Crystallized bergaptene is abundantly soluble in chloroform, ether, or bisulphide of carbon; the alcoholic solution is not altered by ferric salts.

Commerce—Essence of bergamot, as it is always termed in trade, is chiefly shipped from Messina and Palermo in the same kind of bottles as are used for essence of lemon.

Uses—Much employed in perfumery, but in medicine only occasionally for the sake of imparting an agreeable odour to ointments.

Adulteration—Essence of bergamot, like that of lemon, is extensively and systematically adulterated, and very little is sent into the market entirely pure. It is often mixed with oil of turpentine, but a finer adulteration is to dilute it with essential oil of the leaves or with that obtained by distillation of the peel or of the residual fruits. Some has of late been adulterated with petroleum.

The optical properties, as already mentioned, may afford some assistance in detecting fraudulent admixtures, though as regards oil of turpentine it must be borne in mind that there are levogyre as well as dextrogyre varieties. This latter oil and likewise that of lemon is less soluble in spirit of wine than that of bergamot.

CORTEX AURANTII.

Bitter Orange Peel; F. Ecorce ou Zestes d’Oranges amères; G. Pomeranzenschale.

Botanical Origin—Citrus vulgaris Risso (C. Aurantium var. a amara Linn., C. Bigaradia Duhamel).

The Bitter or Seville or Bigarade Orange, Bigaradier[484] of the French, is a small tree extensively cultivated in the warmer parts of the Mediterranean region, especially in Spain, and existing under many varieties.

Northern India is the native country of the orange tree. In Gurhwal, Sikkim, and Khasia there occurs a wild orange which is the supposed parent of the cultivated orange, whether Sweet or Bitter.

The Bitter Orange reproduces itself from seed, and is regarded, at least by cultivators, as quite distinct from the Sweet Orange, from which however it cannot be distinguished by any important botanical characters. Generally speaking, it differs from the latter in having the fruit rugged on the surface, of a more deep or reddish-orange hue, with the pulp very sour and bitter. The peel, as well as the flowers and leaves, are more aromatic than the corresponding parts of the Sweet Orange, and the petiole is more broadly winged.

History—The orange was unknown to the ancient Greeks and Romans; and its introduction to Europe is due to the Arabs, who, according to Gallesio,[485] appear to have established the tree first in Eastern Africa, Arabia, and Syria, whence it was gradually conveyed to Italy, Sicily, and Spain. In the opinion of the writer just quoted, the bitter orange was certainly known at the commencement of the 10th century to the Arabian physicians, one of whom, Avicenna,[486] employed its juice in medicine.

There is strong evidence to show that the orange first cultivated in Europe was the Bitter Orange or Bigarade. The orange tree at Rome, said to have been planted by St. Dominic about a.d. 1200, and which still exists at the monastery of St. Sabina, bears a bitter fruit; and the ancient trees standing in the garden of the Alcazar at Seville are also of this variety. Finally, the oranges of Syria (ab indigenis Orenges nuncupati) described by Jacques de Vitri, Bishop of Acon (ob. a.d. 1214) were acidi seu pontici saporis.[487]

The Sweet Orange began to be cultivated about the middle of the 15th century, having been introduced from the East by the Portuguese. It has probably long existed in Southern China, and may have been taken thence to India. In the latter country there are but few districts in which its cultivation is successful, and the Bitter Orange is hardly known at all. The name it has long borne of China[488] or Portugal Orange indicates what has been the usual opinion as to its origin. It probably alludes more exactly to a superior variety brought about 1630 from China to Portugal.[489]

One of the first importations of oranges into England occurred in a.d. 1290, in which year a Spanish ship came to Portsmouth, of the cargo of which the queen of Edward I. bought one frail of Seville figs, one of raisins or grapes, one bale of dates, 230 pomegranates, 15 citrons, and 7 oranges (“poma de orenge”).[490]

Description—The Bitter Orange known in London as the Seville Orange is a globular fruit, resembling in size, form, and structure the common Sweet Orange, but having the peel much rougher, and when mature of a somewhat deeper hue. The pulp of the fruit is filled with an acid bitter juice. The ripe fruit is imported into London; the peel is removed from it with a sharp knife in one long spiral strip, and quickly dried, or it is sold in the fresh state. It is the more esteemed when cut thin, so as to include as little as possible of the white inner layer.

Well-dried orange peel should be externally of a bright tint and white on its inner surface; it should have a grateful aromatic smell and bitter taste. The peel is also largely imported into London ready dried, especially from Malta. We have observed it from this latter place of three qualities, namely in elliptic pieces or quarters, in broad curled strips, and lastly a very superior kind, almost wholly free from white zest, in strips less than ⅛ of an inch in width, cut apparently by a machine. Such needless subdivision as this last has undergone must greatly favour an alteration and waste of the essential oil. Foreign-dried orange peel fetches a lower price than that dried in England.

Microscopic Structure—There is no difference between the tissues of this drug and those of lemon peel.

Chemical Composition—The essential oil to which the peel of the orange owes its fragrant odour, is a distinct article of commerce, and will be noticed hereafter under a separate head. The other constituents of the peel probably agree with those of lemon peel. The substance mentioned under the name of Hesperidin ([p. 116]) particularly abounds in unripe bitter oranges.

Uses—Bitter orange peel is much used in medicine as an aromatic tonic.

OLEUM NEROLI.

Oleum Aurantii florum; Oil or Essence of Neroli; F. Essence de Néroli; G. Neroliöl.

Botanical Origin—Citrus vulgaris Risso. ([See page 124].)

History—Porta, the Italian philosopher of the 16th century referred to ([p. 118]), was acquainted with the volatile oil of the flowers of the citron tribe (“Oleum ex citriorum floribus”), which he obtained by the usual process of distillation, and describes as possessing the most exquisite fragrance. That distilled from orange flowers acquired a century later (1675-1685) the name of Essence of Neroli from Anne-Marie de la Trémoille-Noirmoutier, second wife of Flavio Orsini, duke of Bracciano and prince of Nerola or Neroli. This lady employed it for the perfuming of gloves, hence called in Italy Guanti di Neroli.[491] It was known in Paris to Pomet, who says[492] the perfumers have given it the name of Neroli, and that it is made in Rome and in Provence.

Production—Oil of Neroli is prepared from the fresh flowers of the Bigarade or Bitter Orange by the ordinary process of distillation with water, conducted in small copper stills. The flowers of all the allied plants are far less aromatic. The water which distills over with the oil constitutes, after the removal of the latter from its surface, the Orange Flower Water (Aqua aurantii florum vel Aqua Naphæ)[493] of commerce. The manufacture is carried on chiefly in the south of France at Grasse, Cannes, and Nice. The yield is about 0·6 to 0·7 per cent. of oil from fresh flowers, as stated by Poiteau et Risso.[494] The flowers of the sweet orange afford but half that amount of oil.

Description and Chemical Composition—Oil of Neroli as found in commerce is seldom pure, for it generally contains an admixture of the essential oil of orange-leaf called Essence of Petit Grain.

By the kind assistance of Mr. F. G. Warrick of Nice, we have obtained a sample of Bigarade Neroli of guaranteed purity, to which the following observations relate. It is of a brownish hue, most fragrant odour, bitterish aromatic taste, and is neutral to test-paper. Its sp. gr. at 11° C. is 0·889. When mixed with alcohol, it displays a bright violet fluorescence, quite distinct from the blue fluorescence of a solution of quinine. In oil of Neroli the phenomenon may be shown most distinctly by pouring a little spirit of wine on to the surface of the essential oil, and causing the liquid to gently undulate. The oil is but turbidly miscible with bisulphide of carbon. It assumes a very pure, intense, and permanent crimson hue if shaken with a saturated solution of bisulphide of sodium. Examined in a column of 100 mm. we observed the oil to deviate the ray of polarized light 6° to the right.

Subjected to distillation, the larger part of the oil passes over at 185°-195° C.; we found this portion to be colourless, yet to display in a marked manner the violet fluorescence and also to retain the odour of the original oil. The portion remaining in the retort was mixed with about the same volume of alcohol (90 per cent.) and some drops of water added, yet not sufficient to occasion turbidity. A very small amount of the crystalline Neroli Camphor then made its appearance, floating on the surface of the liquid; by re-solution in boiling alcohol it was obtained in crystals of rather indistinct form. The redistilled oil gave no camphor whatever.

Neroli Camphor was first noticed by Boullay in 1828. According to our observations it is a neutral, inodorous, tasteless substance, fusible at 55° C., and forming on cooling a crystalline mass. The crystallization should be effected by cooling the hot alcoholic solution, no good crystals being obtainable by slow evaporation or by sublimation. The produce was extremely small, about 60 grammes of oil having yielded not more than 0·1 gramme. Perhaps this scantiness of produce was due to the oil being a year and a half old, for according to Plisson[495] the camphor diminishes the longer the oil is kept.[496] We were unable to obtain any similar substance from the oils of bergamot, petit grain, or orange peel.

Orange Flower Water is a considerable article of manufacture among the distillers of essential oils in the south of Europe, and is imported thence for use in pharmacy. According to Boullay[497] it is frequently acid to litmus when first made,—is better if distilled in small than in large quantities, and if made from the petals per se, rather than from the entire flowers. He also states that only 2 lb. of water should be drawn from 1 lb. of flowers, or 3 lb. if petals alone are placed in the still. As met with in commerce, orange flower water is colourless or of a faintly greenish yellow tinge, almost perfectly transparent, with a delicious odour and a bitter taste. Acidulated with nitric acid, it acquires a pinkish hue more or less intense, which disappears on saturation by an alkali.

Uses—Oil of Neroli is consumed almost exclusively in perfumery. Orange flower water is frequently used in medicine to give a pleasant odour to mixtures and lotions.

Adulteration—The large variation in value of oil of Neroli as shown by price-currents[498] indicates a great diversity of quality. Besides being very commonly mixed, as already stated, with the distilled oil of the leaves (Essence de Petit Grain)[499], it is sometimes reduced by addition of the less fragrant oil obtained from the flowers of the Portugal or Sweet Orange. In some of these adulterations we must conclude that orange flower water participate: metallic contamination of the latter is not unknown.

Other Products of the genus Citrus.

Essence or Essential Oil of Petit Grain—was originally obtained by subjecting little immature oranges to distillation (Pomet—1692); but it is now produced, and to a large extent, by distillation of the leaves and shoots either of the Bigarade or Bitter Orange, or of the Portugal or Sweet Orange. The essence of the former is by far the more fragrant, and commands double the price. Poiteau and Risso[500] state that the leaves of the Brigaradier with bitter fruit are by far the richest in essential oil among all the allied leaves; they are obtained in the lemon-growing districts of the Mediterranean where the essence is manufactured. Lemon-trees being mostly grafted on orange-stocks, the latter during the summer put forth shoots, which are allowed to grow till they are often some feet in length. The cultivator then cuts them off, binds them in bundles, and conveys them to the distiller of Petit Grain. The strongest shoots are frequently reserved for walking-sticks. The leaves of the two sorts of orange are easily distinguished by their smell when crushed. Essence of Petit Grain, which in odour has a certain resemblance to Neroli, is used in perfumery and especially in the manufacture of Eau de Cologne.

According to Gladstone (1864) it consists mainly of a hydrocarbon probably identical with that from oil of Neroli.

Essential Oil of Orange Peel—is largely made at Messina and also in the south of France. It is extracted by the sponge-, or by the écuelle-process, and partly from the Bigarade and partly from the Sweet or Portugal Orange, the scarcely ripe fruit being in either case employed. The oil made from the former is much more valuable than that obtained from the latter, and the two are distinguished in price-currents as Essence de Bigarade and Essence de Portugal.

These essences are but little consumed in England, in liqueur-making and in perfumery. For what is known of their chemical nature, the reader can consult the works named at foot[501].

Essence of Cedrat—The true Citron or Cedrat tree is Citrus medica Risso, and is of interest as being the only member of the Orange tribe the fruit of which was known in ancient Rome. The tree itself, which appears to have been cultivated in Palestine in the time of Josephus, was introduced into Italy in about the 3rd century. In a.d. 1003 it was much grown at Salerno near Naples, whence its fruits were sent as presents to the Norman princes[502].

At the present day, the citron appears to be nowhere cultivated extensively, the more prolific lemon tree having generally taken its place. It is however scattered along the Western Riviera, and is also grown on a small scale about Pizzo and Paola on the western coast of Calabria, in Sicily, Corsica, and Azores. Its fruits, which often weigh several pounds, are chiefly sold for being candied. For this purpose the peel, which is excessively thick, is salted and in that state shipped to England and Holland. The fruit has a very scanty pulp[503].

Essence of Cedrat which is quoted in some price-lists may be prepared from the scarcely ripe fruit by the sponge-process; but as it is more profitable to export the fruit salted, it is very rarely manufactured, and that which bears its name is for the most part fictitious.

FRUCTUS BELÆ.

Bela; Bael Fruit, Indian Bael, Bengal Quince.

Botanical Origin—Ægle Marmelos[504] Correa (Cratæva Marmelos L.), a tree found in most parts of the Indian peninsula, which is often planted in the neighbourhood of temples, being esteemed sacred by the Hindus. It is truly wild in the forests of the Coromandel Ghâts and of the Western Himalaya, ascending often to 4,000 feet and growing gregarious when wild.

It attains a height of 30-40 feet, is usually armed with strong sharp thorns and has trifid leaves, the central leaflet being petiolate and larger than the lateral. The fruit is a large berry, 2 to 4 inches in diameter, variable in shape, being spherical or somewhat flattened like an orange, ovoid, or pyriform[505], having a smooth hard shell; the interior divided into 10-15 cells each containing several woolly seeds, consists of a mucilaginous pulp, which becomes very hard in drying. In the fresh state the fruit is very aromatic, and the juicy pulp which it contains has an agreeable flavour, so that when mixed with water and sweetened, it forms a palatable refrigerant drink. The fruit is never eaten as dessert, though its pulp is sometimes made into a preserve with sugar.

The fruit of the wild tree is described as small, hard, and flavourless, remaining long on the tree. The bark of the stem and root, the flowers and the expressed juice of the leaves are used in medicine by the natives of India.

History—The tree under the name of Bilva[506] is constantly alluded to as an emblem of increase and fertility in ancient Sanskrit poems, some of which as the Yajar Veda are supposed to have been written not later than 1000 b.c.—Constantinus Africanus was acquainted with the fruit under notice.