196 Panax quinquefolium. 
ment of duties, which exceeded the price the article could com- 
mand, : 
Ginseng was formerly considered as the peculiar production of 
Chinese Tartary, and was not, until the enquiries and investigations 
of M. Sarrasin,* Lafiteau,t Bartram,t and Kalm,@ discovered to exist 
in North America. The high value of this article in China, and 
the virtues it was reputed to possess, rendered it a subject worthy 
of enquiry, whether the plant found in this country was iden- 
tical with the Tartarian species. Accurate examinations of the two 
plants, in comparison With each other, soon satisfied botanists of their 
identity; and the Chinese have long accredited the roots of our 
Panax quinquefolium, sent to them for consumption, as the veritable 
Ginseng of Tartary. Accordingly they eagerly purchased it from us, 
and hence it became an article of extensive traffic with them. Those 
roots were found to meet with the readiest sale, which were clarified 
after the manner used in China, to purify or render it transparent. 
The most authentic account we have of the Eastern plant 
which produces the esteemed Ginseng of the Chinese, is by Father 
* See Memoirs of the French Academy of Sciences, 1718, where this writer has 
given a copious account of American Ginseng. 
t A Jesuit and missionary among the Iroquois of this country. 
$Jobn Bartram. 
§ Travels. 
