know its effects—I confesd myself to have 
pointed somewhat in these, but as T: wave en re’ 
by a discouraging word, the laudable advances we are _ 
making, in the United States, to imitate the zeal of Euro- 
pean chemists, which has so much improved and enriched 
our code of medicines, I forbear to do more than express . 
an earnest desire that no carelessness in its Preparation 
may Jead physicians to discard it. a 
No, 414.—Pastinaca Opoponax. Opoponax, « or 
Rough Parsnip. 
OFEFICINAL. Opoponacis gummi resina. Lond. Oppponsx, 
Cabinet specimen, Jeff. Coll, No. 516—figure of the plant, 
No. 517. 
A pentandrous, umbelliferous, perennial plant, hative of the 
Levant and-south of Europe, with a yellow root as thick 
as a man’s arm, invested with a corky bark. In the Le- 
vant, incisions are made in them, the lactiferous juice 
exudes, and, dried in the sun, is Opoponax. It comes from 
Turkey, in tears or drops, or in irregular lumps. 
Quaritres, Stron disagreeable smell, bitter acrid taste—~ 
according to Pelletier, 1s a compound of gu resin, starch, 
extractive, wax, sialic acid, a trace: €aoutchouc, and — 
- essential % - 
Mepicat Prorertizs snp Uses: 
as an emmenagogue—given in 
other fetid gums—dose, grs. x to 38s. _ 
No. 415.—PETROLEUM. Barbadoes Ter EWephthe ; 
- See No. 114. 
Ree = : rpractitie 
_ raises the temperature of the bodys Sect the secre- 
tions, particularly of the kidneys; in Ss 
ergic is said to incite de- 
nervous, and intellectual ene 
yoirs to Venus—and h Mas been used t rouse the 
- torpid, to renovate the fa d, or restore the lost, procre- 
