596 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



CUNDURANGO AGAIN. 



The subject of cundurango continues to excite the interest 

 of scientific and medical men in both hemispheres. Our South 

 American and European periodicals alike make frequent refer- 

 ence to the subject, taking every variety of ground in regard 

 to the value of the druse. A member of the Pharmaceutical 

 Society of London concludes, as the result of experiments, 

 that the plant has very little practical value ; these deter- 

 minations, however, being based, according to the votaries of 

 the article, upon experiments with inferior or spurious speci- 

 mens of it. 



Dr. Jaramillo, of Guayaquil, recently announced that his 

 experiments have not been satisfactory in the cases of cancer, 

 but have been eminently successful in curing syphilis, as well 

 as intestinal, urethral, and uterine ulcers caused by the syph- 

 ilitic diathesis, and thinks that, whatever be the stage of the 

 disease, very positive benefit must result from its application. 

 Some of his experiments were tried with a decoction of the 

 wood without the bark, but the combination of the two he 

 considers desirable. 



Reduced to a powder, he says an ounce will kill a good- 

 sized dog, while for ordinary medical treatment a decoction 

 obtained from not less than an ounce nor more than a pound 

 is advisable. The milk of the plant he has applied to ulcer- 

 ated surfaces, and found that this hastened cicatrization. He 

 refers to statements of Dr. Buyon, of which we recently gave 

 an extract, and thinks that his experiments must have been 

 performed with some other plant, and that the guaco, or 

 cundurango of Ecuador, is not the same as that of Colombia, 

 the one being the Equatoria garciana (a name, however, not 

 known to botanical science), the other Mikania guaco. Ac- 

 cording to Dr. Jaramillo, a man aged fifty, who had suffered 

 fourteen months with rheumatism, and who had become con- 

 torted in an extraordinary degree, was cured in two months 

 by the external and internal use of this substance. These 

 statements we commit to our readers without, of course, pre- 

 tending to decide what amount of importance is to be attach- 

 ed to them. Panama Star and Herald, November 2, 1871. 



