Tas. 6135. 
RHEUM OFFICINALE. 
Native of Eastern Tibet and Western China. 
Nat. Ord, Potyconace®.—Tribe PTERYGOCARPA. 
Genus Rueum, Linn. ; (Meissn., in DC. Prodr., v. xiv. p. 32). 
Rurvm officinale ; caule brevi robusto diviso apice folioso, foliis amplis or- 
biculari-ovatis cordatisve villosulis subpalmatim breviter 3-7-lobatis, 
lobis incisis lobulisque acutis, ochrea obovoidea densum fissa, petiolo 
robusto pubescente intus haud sulcato, ramis floriferis foliosis panicu- 
latim ramulosis, panicule erecte ramulis patenti-recurvis, ultimis flori- 
feris spiciformibus nutantibus densifloris, floribus breviter gracile 
pedicellatis, pedicello basin versus articulato, perianthii foliolis late 
oblongis apice rotundatis interioribus paulo majoribus, staminibus 9 
inclusis, disco annulari crenulato, stigmatibus orbiculatis, acheenio late 
oblongo alis membranaceis obscure crenulatis nucleo duplo longioribus 
et laterioribus. 
Ruevo officinale, Baillon in Mém. de U' Association Francaise pour vAvance- 
ment des Sciences, Sept. 1, Bordeaux, 1872, p. 514, t. x. (Translated in 
Trimen Journ. Bot., 1872, p. 8379); Adansonia, vol. x. p. 246; Car- 
ridre, Rev. Hortic., 1874, p. 93; Pluck. § Hanbury, Pharmacog., p. 442; 
Gard. Chron., 1874, v. i. p. 346. 
According to the evidence hitherto obtained, this grand 
plant (which is certainly the handsomest of all the Rheuus, 
except the Himalayan £2. nodile) is that which produces much, 
if not all the Turkey Rhubarb of the pharmacopata. It isa 
native of and also cultivated in Eastern and South-eastern 
Tibet, and was sent thence by the French missionaries to M. 
Dabry, the French Consul at Hankow. M. Dabry sent plants 
to M. Soubeiran, Secretary of the J ardin d’Acclimatisation of 
Paris, where they flowered at Montmorency m 1871. 
An excellent history of this plant is given in Fluckiger and 
Hanbury’s “ Pharmacographia,” quoted above, from which it 
appears not to be certain that the true Turkey rhubarb of 
commerce is derived exclusively from this plant, though the 
evidence of the missionaries who discovered it, that it is the 
main source of that drug, is supported by the fact that there 
is no important discrepancy between this R. officinale and the 
DECEMBER. 1st, 1874. 
