CINCHONA. 



declaring not only that those species do not yield the barks employed 

 in European practice, but that the bark they do yield is so inferior as 

 to be valueless in pharmacy, a difference productive of no small em- 

 barrassment to the merchant who imports barks for medical use. Even 

 in the mere physiological part of the question we have one writer 

 asserting that bark of the best quality is obtained from the trunk and 

 oldest branches of the Cinchona trees, and another as positively 

 assuring us that " the bark of old trees, and especially those of the 

 trunk and larger branches form a sort of Quina Peruviana, much in- 

 ferior in efficacy to that from the suckers, and younger or middle-sized 

 branches." As to Botanical differences regarding the distinctions of 

 species, the subject is if possible still more embroiled. Some writers 

 would have us believe that the Cinchonas form an exception to all 

 known rules, and that the most dissimilar trees, inhabiting the most 

 opposite climates, are either identical, or mere varieties of each other ; 

 while others have maintained that the number of species is very con- 

 siderable, and that the differences between them in structure are 

 accompanied by most important distinctions in the value of their bark. 



I need not say that under these circumstances it became necessary 

 to look at the genus Cinchona, in preparing an account of it for this 

 work, with a much more critical eye than would have been necessary 

 had the opinions and statements of writers been less conflicting. 

 Fortunately there exists in this country more complete Botanical 

 evidence concerning the genus than in any other part of Europe. My 

 friend and colleague Dr. A. T. Thomson, Professor of Materia Medica 

 in University College, has a most extensive series of dried specimens 

 taken out of a Spanish prize during the war ; and Mr. Lambert is the 

 fortunate possessor not only of a nearly complete set of the species 

 described in the Flora Peruviana, obtained from Madrid, but of several 

 unpublished species, and also of a MS. Compe/idio historico-medico 

 comercial de las Quinas, from the pen of Don Hippolito Ruiz. All these 

 have been unreservedly placed at my disposal for examination by their re- 

 spective possessors, to whom I beg leave thus to offer my sincere thanks. 



Of course I have considered the question botanicaily, not pharma- 

 ceutically, except so far as to determine if possible the real origin of the 

 barks known in trade and used in the shops. Even this has obliged me to 

 extend the account of the genus very much beyond the limits within 

 which I had wished to confine it in the present work ; but I have felt 

 that if I hoped my opinions to carry any weight with them, that result 

 could only be obtained by showing in sufficient detail upon what 

 evidence they are founded. It has been my anxious wish to take 

 the most dispassionate view of the conflicting opinions that have ne- 

 cessarily been brought under consideration, and it is no little satisfac- 

 tion to me to find that the result of my Botanical inquiries coincides 

 very closely with the conclusions of the best modern pharmacologists. 



It appears to me that most of the confusion which has been in- 

 troduced into the history of the genus Cinchona, has arisen from the 

 world having formed a false estimate of the Botanical skill and con- 

 sequent credibility, of the most original writers upon the subject. It is so 

 essential to a just estimate of the value of evidence that this should be 

 better understood, that I feel obliged to occupy a page or two with 

 remarks upon that point, by way of introduction to the account here 

 given of the species and their products. 



Don Jose Celestino Mutis, a Spanish Botanist living at Santa Fe de 

 407 D D 4 



