108 MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN BULLETIN 
having the opposite effect from that of the disease, gained 
prominence. It is this doctrine, in a modified form, which 
later became known as allopathy, in distinction from the 
doctrine of homeopathy which began to gain adherents late 
in the eighteenth century. This advocated the cure of dis- 
eases with drugs having an action similar to that of the dis- 
ease itself. But the real progress in pharmacology came 
when the true causes of disease were discovered and the 
actions of drugs scientifically investigated. Generalizations, 
superstitions and myths gave way to rational experimenta- 
tion, and to-day pharmacology holds a dignified position 
among the other natural sciences. It is true that some drugs 
are still applied empirically, following the dictates of experi- 
ence, but this is because the disease is imperfectly known. 
The rational administering of drugs presupposes a thorough 
knowledge of the disease. 
While the advance in pharmacology has added many 
animal and mineral products to the pharmacists’ shelves, 
vegetable drugs still occupy a very prominent place. Their 
collection and preparation is an important industry and, 
while the great bulk of medicinal plants are gathered from 
their native haunts, the large demand for certain ones has 
made their cultivation necessary and profitable. In the 
medicinal garden of the Missouri Botanical Garden over 500 
recognized drug-yielding plants have been assembled and 
segregated into poe according to their accepted physio- 
logical action. It is, of course, not possible to indicate the 
special uses for which each plant is suited. For this informa- 
tion special treatises on materia medica must be consulted. 
The medicinal garden lies west of the rose garden, and 
may be reached by a cinder path starting at the tall cypress 
tree directly west of the rose pergola. ile the collection 
contains upwards of 500 medicinal plants, not all of these 
may be seen growing at any one time. Thus, at present, the 
spring- and early summer-flowering plants will be found miss- 
ing in many instances, having already flowered and disap- 
peared. But the following enumeration of the plants at 
present growing in the medicinal garden will give some idea 
of the classes of drug plants represented, as well as of the © 
species themselves. 
Class 1. Antispasmodics—Agents which prevent or allay 
spasm of voluntary or et tie 4 muscles in any portion 
of the organism. Poison hemlock (Coniwm maculatum), 
tobacco (Nicotiana Tabacum), Indian tobacco (Lobelia in- 
flata), chamomile (Anthemis nobilis), horse nettle (Solanum 
