302 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



medicinal qualities, and of which bunches in a dry state are preserved 

 in so many Indian huts, is found in considerable patches in the moist 

 ravines through which streams occasionally flow from the mountain 

 ranges. I have succeeded in collecting and preserving the seeds and 

 bulbs of above one hundred species of plants and trees, which I shall 

 transmit to the United States." 



CURE FOR HYDROPHOBIA. 



M. D'HERICOURT, who has recently returned from a long residence 

 in Abyssinia, has brought home, among other valuable articles, 

 numerous specimens of a plant, the root of which is a cure for hy- 

 drophobia, both in men and animals. When presenting specimens 

 of this plant to the French Academy, on Nov. 12th, M. d'Heri- 

 court says: "In preparing this medicine, the bark of the root is 

 slightly scraped, after which the root itself is dried and reduced to a 

 powder. 10 or 12 grains are given to the patient in a spoonful of 

 honey or milk. An hour or two after having taken this dose, and af- 

 ter he has had several discharges and vomitings, many cups of whey 

 are given him, and when he is much weakened by the discharges, he 

 is made to eat the gizzard of a fowl roasted in butter, and well spiced, 

 which stops the effect of the medicine. The patient also eats the 

 chickep, cooked in the same w T ay, with a great deal of spice. It is 

 probable that French physicians will do away with this portion of the 

 treatment. This root, whose 'emetic cathartic' effects I have seen, 

 acts also on the urine, in which I have found microscopic worms. A 

 soldier and three dogs that had been bitten were treated by this root 

 in my presence, and were cured, while a fourth dog, bitten at the same 

 time, but not so treated, died. 



" I have brought from Abyssinia the plant whose roots produce the 

 remarkable effects mentioned ; it grows in low and warm regions, in 

 an ' argillaceous silicious ' soil ; its tap-root attains the length of more 

 than a metre* with a diameter of two or three centimetres ; its active 

 property appears to reside under the epidermis. The head of the root 

 is relatively very large, and produces numerous creeping sterns, some 

 of which are more than two metres long; the stem is square, slender, 

 about three millimetres in diameter, and has a sort of prickly hair on 

 it. The leaves, resembling those of the tribe cucurbilaccca, have five 

 principal divisions, and are alternate, being placed opposite to tendrils, 

 and three or four centimetres apart. The flowers are placed at the 

 extremity of the ovary, and there are several of them upon the same 

 stem. The fruit is oblong, smooth, of a greenish-yellow color, and 

 when ripe is from three to four centimetres long." 



EXISTENCE OF OVULES IN THE MALE OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS. 



DR. CH. ROBIN, having submitted to the Paris Academy of Sci- 

 ences a paper " On the existence of an ovum or ovule, as well in the 

 male as in the female of plants and animals; producing in the one 

 case pollen-grains, in the other the primitive cells of the embryo," a 



* A metre equals about 39.37 inches. 



