' BOTANICON SINICUM. 29 
ts‘ao. There is however a statement in the Ti mang shi hi 
(History of the early Emperors, compiled in the 3rd century) 
that Huang ti (the successor of Shen nung) ordered his minister 
Kt po (see note 12) to examine the efficacies of plants, to 
compose a Pen ts‘ao king (a standard herbal), and to lay down 
prescriptions for curing diseases. This proves that the appella- 
tion of Pen ts‘ao can be traced back to the time of Huang ti. 
Nature had bestowed on the ancient sages peculiar faculties for 
recognizing instinctively, by the taste of natural productions, 
what was their efficacy in curing sickness. The rules they 
established were followed by the sages of later times who tried to 
complete and to enlarge the original matter. 
According to Li Shi chen (the author of the Pen ts‘ao kang 
mu), the Shen nung Pen ts‘ao king was originally a treatise in 
three parts treating of 365 different drugs. It was first com- 
mented on by Z'‘ao Hung hing (A.D. 452-536) who wrote also a 
supplement to it (see further on Ming yi pie In). 
In the great catalogue of the Imperial Library, book 104, fol. 
51, we read that the Shen nung Pen ts‘ao king does not exist 
now-a-days as a separate treatise and that we know it only from 
the Z*ang Shen wei Pen ts‘ao (a Materia medica of the Sung 
dynasty; see further on No. 26.) in which the passages printed in 
white letters on black ground all refer to the text of the Shen 
nung Pen ts‘ao. 
The Pen ts‘ao kang mu reproduces also to some extent the 
text of the Materia medica of Shen nung and generally quotes 
this treatise under the abbreviated title of Je #% Pen king. Under 
the head of “the celebrated arrangement of drugs by the Em- 
peror Shen nung” the Pen ts‘ao kang mu, in the first book, first 
part, fol. 43 sq., gives the text of a part of the Shen nung Pen 
ts‘ao relating to the qualities, the use, the gathering of drugs, ete. 
‘That ancient document arranges the drugs under 3 classes and 
reads as follows : 
Of the first class of drugs there are 120 sorts which are — 
considered to perform the functions of #4 Kiin or Sovereiyns. — 
They support human life,and thereby resemble Heaven. They are 
not poisonous. Whatever quantity you take, or howsoever longyou 
