Berberidee.| THE HIMALAYAN MOUNTAINS. 63 
the Hill people as raisins, and sent down to the plains. The root and wood being of a 
dark yellow colour, forming the dar-huld (yellow wood) of Persian authors, are used as 
a dye, and being bitter and a little astringent, are also, as well as the bark, employed in 
medicine. The variety of B. Asiatica found on the N eelgherries, and called by M. 
Leschenault de Latour B. tinctoria, from the use to which it has been applied, has, 
by the experiments of M. Vauquelin, been proved to be inferior to few woods for dyeing 
a yellow colour. 
The wood and bark of the Himalayan species of Barberry are not only used simply 
in India, but an extract is prepared from them, which is to be found in every bazar, 
and described in all the works on Materia Medica. This is prepared by digesting in 
water sliced pieces of the root, stem, and branches, of any of the species of Barberry, in 
an iron vessel, boiling for some time, straining, and then evaporating to a proper con- 
sistence. This extract is much employed in Indian medicine, and every where known 
by the name of rusot. Of this the Arabic synonyme is Hooziz, and the Greek is said 
to be logfyon eis) which I have no doubt should have been written ,,3) lookyon, as the 
letters f — and k (3, in writing, differ only in the first having one, and the other two 
diacritical points placed over it; and the one is therefore frequently confounded with the 
other by transcribers, particularly in writing foreign words. That the mistake has been 
made here is evident from. the description attached to Hooziz being almost a literal 
translation of the Lycium (Avxioy) of Dioscorides, lib. 1. c. 133. where two kinds are 
described, and the avxiy wSixov considered the best. The first, or that which was the 
produce of Lycia and Cappadocia, is considered by Dr. Sibthorp to have been procured 
from Rhamnus infectorius. In India, where every thing has remained for so many 
centuries without any change, it is probable that in the most ancient, as in the 
present times, Hooziz hindee, or Lycium Indicum, was procured from the several species 
of Berberis, which are indigenous to the Hindoo-koosh and Himalayan Mountains.* 
The rusot is much used by native practitioners as an external application, both in the 
incipient and advanced stage of ophthalmia; it is frequently also employed by European 
practitioners, either alone, or with equal parts of opium and alum rubbed up in water, 
and applied round the eye. I have seen it particularly useful when the acute symptoms 
have subsided, and the eye is so much swoln as to prevent the effectual application of 
any other remedy. By one surgeon of rank and experience it was found particularly 
useful in the ophthalmia, with which the European soldiers were afflicted on their return 
from Egypt; and Mr. Playfair, the translator of the Taleef-Shureef, says, that it is 
perhaps the best application in ophthalmia ever used. . 
‘The most remarkable and best-known Indian species of Berberis, are B. Nepalensis, 
which is considered to be the same as the ler Japonica of Thunberg; B. Wallichiana, 
Pl. As. Rar. t. 243; B. Asiatica, of which B. tinctoria is considered by De Candolle to 
be only a variety; and B. aristata. To these a new species from Kunawur has been 
added. 
* y. a Paper on the Lycium of Dioscorides in the forthcoming part of the Transactions of the Linnean Society. 
