266 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



have been very small. The perceiiUige of shipments refused entry 

 as adulterated because of pollution due to careless bottlin*^ or to con- 

 tamination of the sources of the supply has been rather high. Relabel- 

 ing has been reijuired in some instances to eliminate exaggerated 

 and unwarranted statements as to curative or therapeutic effect. 

 Goods labeled as radioactive have revealed on examination little or 

 nothing to justify such labeling. 



Among adulterated drugs might be mentioned an ingeniously 

 sophisticated shipment of so-called saffron, consisting of the dyed 

 and weighted flowers of a plant unrelated to saffron and without 

 either tinctorial or flavoring value. Quite a number of shipments 

 of anise seed have been found to be adulterated with exhausted seed 

 from which the volatile oil had been extracted, one shipment contain- 

 ing as much as Co per cent of this worthless product. A number of 

 shipments have been examined of Levant wormseed, santonica, which 

 is gathered in the deserts of Turkestan and is the source of santonin, 

 a valuable drug, the importation of which had practically stopped. 

 Many of them, however, were found almost totally deficient in san- 

 tonin and were refused entry. 



Shipments of crude drugs deficient in active principles have been 

 allowed entry for legitimate manufacturing purposes only, under 

 conditions more fully outlined in last year's report. Many medicinal 

 preparations bearing statements of therapeutic or curative effect 

 have been relabeled more nearly in accord with the limits of useful- 

 ness of the ingredients. 



Among the crude drugs which have been substituted for well-known 

 drugs or for the official species noted this year not mentioned in the 

 re]:>ort of the Chemist in former yeai*s are the following : Piper ribe- 

 sioides Wall, for the official cubeb. Piper cuheba L. ; Berheris^ sp. for 

 Columbo root, Jateorhiza pahiiata (Lamarck) Miers; Richardsonia 

 pilosa^ H. B. K. for ipecac, Cephaelis ipecacuanha^ Rich.; Indian 

 valerian, Valeriana wallichii, D. C, and Mexican valerian, VaIe7Jana 

 mexicana, D. C, or related species for valerian, Valeriana ojficinalis^ L. 

 A shipment of Cocillana, N. F., Guarea rushyi (Britton) Rusby, was 

 invoiced as quinine bark. 



Table 4 gives the distribution of the official samples examined by 

 the various field stations. It does not include samples of thousands 

 of shipments examined in a preliminary way. 



