part 2

(1857), 699.

[9] _Pharm. Journ._ xi. (1852) 204; also _Mat. Med. l.c._

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]

[10] See also Meyer, _Geschichte der Botanik_, ii. (1855) 419.

[11] _F. Z. Ermerins_, Anecdota medica Græca, e codicibus MSS. expromsit. Lugd. Bat. 1840. Leonis Philosophi et Medici conspectus medicinæ, lib. iii. cap. I. (Κεϕ. ά. Περὶὑϕθαλμῶν.....σαρκοκόλλς, γλαμκίῳ, μαμηρᾀ καἰ καμϕορᾷ).

[12] Yule, _Cathay and the way thither_, (Hakluyt Society) i. (1866) p. ccxvi.

[13] Davies, _Report on the trade of the countries on the N. W. boundary of India_, Lahore, 1862.

[14] Otherwise written _Honglane_, _Chonlin_, _Chynlen_, _Chouline_, _Souline_, &c.

[15] _Specimen Medicinæ Sinicæ_, Med. Simp. No. 27.

[16] _Mat. Med._ ii. (1778) 908.

[17] _Hist. des Drog._ ii. (1849) 526.

[18] _Trans. of Med. and Phys. Soc. of Calcutta_, iii. (1827) 432.

[19] Teeta is the Hindustani tāītā, from the Sanskrit tikta, “bitter.” (Dr. Rice.)

[20] Two cases were offered for sale as _Olen_ or _Mishmee_ by Messrs. Gray and Clark, drug-brokers, 22nd Nov. 1858.

=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]

[21] _Journ. of Chem. Soc._ xv. (1862) 339.

[22] Gross in _Am. Journ. of Pharm._ May 1873. 193.

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_.”

[23] O. Schneider, _Nicandrea_, Lips. 1856. 271.

[24] _De Mat. Med._ lib. iv. c. 153.

[25] Puschmann’s edition (quoted in the Appendix) i. 450.

[26] _De Compositione Medicamentorum_, c. 165.

[27] Lib. xxiii. c. 13.

[28] _Libro della Agricultura_, Venet. (1511) lib. vi. c. 108.

[29] _Clavis Sanationis_, Venet. 1510.

=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.

[30] _Ann. de Chimie et de Phys._ lii. (1833) 352.

[31] The platinic compound is in fine microscopic crystals.

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 theessential 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.

[32] _Pharm. Journ._ vi. (1865) 405, and vii. (1877) 1043.

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.

[33] We use the word _root_ as most in accordance with the teaching of English botanists.

[34] _Journal de mon troisième voyage en Chine_, i. (Paris 1875) 367.

[35] F. Porter Smith, _Mat. Med. and Nat. Hist. of China_, Shanghai, 1871. 2, 3.

[36] Pliny, lib. xxvii. c. 76, also xxv. 25.

[37] _The Physicians of Myddvai_; _Meddygon Myddfai_. Published for the Welsh MSS. Society. Llandovery, 1861. 282, 457.

[38] _De Stramonio, Hyoscyamo et Aconito_, Vindob. 1762.

=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:—

C₃₃H₄₃NO₁₂. OH₂ = C₇H₆O₂. C₂₆H₃₉NO₁₁, Aconitine. Benzoic acid. Aconine.

and pseudaconitine breaks up in accordance with the equation:

C₃₆H₄₉NO₁₁. OH₂ = C₉H₁₀O₄. C₂₇H₄₁NO₈ Pseudaconitine. Dimethyl- Pseudaconine. protocatechnic acid.

[39] _Pharm. Journ._ 1875 to 1878, also _Yearbook of Pharmacy_, the results being summarized in the _Yearbook_ for 1877, 466.—Comparative qualitative reactions of Aconitine, Aconine, Pseudaconitine, and Pseudaconine, see _Yearbook_ (1877) 459.

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.

[40] Thus the continental druggists are able to offer it in quantity as low as 4_d._ to 5_d._ per lb., and a pound, we find, contains fully 150 roots!

[41] See figure in Berg’s _Atlas zur pharm. Waarenkunde_ (1865) fig. 24.

[42] Hanbury, _Science Papers_ (1876) 258, with figure. See also _Pharm. Journ._ ix. (1879) 615, where the drug is derived from Aconitum Fischeri.

[43] Their microscopic structure is figured in the paper of Dr. Dunin (quoted farther on, in our article on Aconitum heterophyllum at p. 14) 217-225.

[44] _Pharm. Journ._ vii. (1877) 749.

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.

[45] Gmelin, _Chemistry_, xi. (1857) 402.

[46] Wittstein’s _Vierteljahresschrift_, xviii. (1869) 82, also _Jahresbericht_ of Wiggers and Husemann (1869) 12.

[47] _Pharm. Journ._ viii. (1867) 118.

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.

[48] The Arabic name _Bish_ or Persian _Bis_ is stated by Moodeen Sheriff in his _Supplement to the Pharmacopœia of India_ (p. 265) to be a more correct designation than _Bikh_, which seems to be a corruption of doubtful origin. We find that the Arabian writer Ibn Baytar gives the word as _Bish_ (not _Bikh_).

[49] Figured in Bentley and Trimen, _Med. Plants_ (1877) pt. 27.

[50] _Flor. Ind._ i. (1855) 54, 57; and Introd. Essay, 3.

[51] Abu Mansur Mowafik ben Ali Alherui, _Liber Fundamentorum Pharmacologiæ_, i. (Vindob. 1830) 47. Seligmann’s edition.

[52] Valgrisi edition, 1564, lib. ii. tract. 2. it. N. (p. 347).

[53] Ibn Baytar, Sontheimers transl. i. (1840) 199.

[54] Clusius, _Exotica_, 289.

[55] _Pharm. Persica_, 1681, p. 17, 319, 358. The word _bisch_ is correctly given in Arabic characters, so that of its identity there can be no dispute. (_Pharm. persica_, see appendix: Angelus.)

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]

[56] _Account of the Kingdom of Nepal_, Edin. 1819, 98.

[57] _Musée Helvétique d’Hist. Nat._ Berne, i. (1823) 160.

[58] Yet strange to say confused the plant with _A. Napellus_, an Indian form of which he figured as _A. ferox_!

[59] _Edinb. New Phil Journ._ xlvii. (1849) 366, pl. 5.

[60] The first importation was in 1869, when ten bags containing 1,000 lbs., said to be part of a much larger quantity actually in London, were offered for sale by a drug-broker.

[61] There is a rude woodcut of the root in _Pharm. Journ._ i. (1871) 434.

[62] A specimen of ordinary _Bish_ in my possession for two or three years became much infested by a minute and active insect of the genus _Psocus_.—D. H.

[63] Obligingly sent to me in 1867 by Messrs. Rogers & Co. of Bombay, who say it is the only kind there procurable.—D. H.

[64] According to Moodeen Sheriff (_Supplement to Pharm. of India_, pp. 25-32, 265) there are several kinds of aconite root found in the Indian bazaars, some of them highly poisonous, others innocuous. The first or poisonous aconites he groups under the head _Aconitum ferox_, while the second, of which there are three varieties mostly known by the Arabic name _Jadvár_ (Persian _Zadvár_), he refers to undetermined species of _Aconitum_.

The surest and safest names in most parts of India for the poisonous aconite roots are _Bish_ (Arabic); _Bis_ (Persian); _Singyā-bis_, _Mīthā-zahar_, _Bachhnāg_ (Hindustani); _Vasha-nāvi_ (Tamil); _Vasa-nābhi_ (Malyalim).

=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.

[65] Beautifully figured in Royle’s _Illustrations of the Botany of the Himalayan mountains_, &c., 1839, tab. 13; also in Bentley and Trimen’s _Medicinal Plants_,