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PHARMACOPCEIAL VEGETABLE DRUGS.

necessary. It may be briefly stated that this insidiously active drugcame to the attention of the profession of medicine through its well-known qualities, as established by the people of its native land. Muchthe writer recorded concerning opium and its culture as noted in histravels in Turkey, is to be found in Lloyd Brothers' Drug TreatiseNo. XXII, "Opium and Its Compounds."

PAREIRA

Pareira brava (Chondrodendron tomentosum) is a climbingshrub, native to Peru and Brazil. and adjacent sections of SouthAmerica. The Portuguese missionaries of the seventeenth Centurywho visited Brazil learned of its reputed qualities from the natives,who under the name abutua or butua valued it highly for its thera-peutic virtues. The Portuguese gave it the name Pareira brava, orwild vine, with reference to its mode of growth. Its reputed medicinalqualities, learned from the natives, were made conspicuous by MichelAmelot, ambassador of Louis XIV to Lisbon, who found it in thatcity and carried it with him to Paris. The botanist Pomet (519),1694, described the plant in his "History of Drugs," Paris. After aneventful botanical record embracing considerable discussion as wellas confusion with some other drugs, during which Pareira brava en-joyed professional conspicuity in Europe, it dropped from generaluse, the extraordinary pretensions long made for it being now prac-tically forgotten.

PEPO

The seed of the pumpkin, Cucurbita pepo, in the form of an in-fusion as well as in a pulpy mass, has been long a favorite homeremedy for intestinal parasites, which use introduced it to the medicalprofession. Although the medical profession has used pumpkin seedsomewhat in this direction, as a rule they now prefer other remedialagents, santonin being employed for round worms and pomegranatebark for tape worms.

PHYSOSTIGMA

Physostigma, Calabar bean (Physostigma venenosum), is thefruit of an African vine growing near the mouths of the Niger andthe Old Calabar Rivers, Guinea, where it furnished one of the ordealtests of the pagan tribes of tropical Western Africa. The seed istherefore known as the "Ordeal Bean," and was administered in theform of either an emulsion or infusion, as the case might be. It wasintroduced to England by Dr. F. W. Daniel (182), about 1840, itsmethod of use being again mentioned by him in a paper read beforethe Ethnological Society, 1846. Professor Balfour (36), of Edin-burgh, obtained the plant from the Rev. W. C. Thompson, a missionaryto the west coast of Africa, and described it in a paper read beforethe Royal Society of Edinburgh, including it also in his "History ofPlants." Its power of contracting the pupil of the eye was discoveredby Dr. T. R. Fräser (246) of Edinburgh. Its power of paralyzing the

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