MEADOW SAFFRON. 375 



The specific gravity of the juices is also changed, 

 which proves that a chemical action has taken 

 place. 



We would particularly recommend young medi- 

 cal students to make themselves acquainted with 

 the nature of these chemical changes as it regards 

 the properties of vegetables ; for^ as the most 

 powerful medicine becomes modified by being com- 

 bined with other articles, whose action upon the 

 body is different, the result of certain combinations 

 cannot be even conjectured without previous expe- 

 rience. Every medical practitioner knows that the 

 combination of opium and ipecacuanha produces a 

 result widely different from either the narcotic pro- 

 perties of the one, or the emetic qualities of the 

 other ; and we therefore trust that they will not let 

 the fashionable rage for simplicity in medicine pre- 

 vent their studying a preparation of Colchicum, 

 that may be relied on for a more certain uniformity 

 of action than any that has hitherto been discovered, 

 and that may at the same time be more free from 

 the disagreeable and dangerous effects which too 

 frequently attend the Ban Medicinale. 



The most eminent practitioners of modern times 

 have acknowledged the extraordinary effects of the 

 Colchicum in relieving that complicated form of 

 disease called rheumatic gout ; but they have at the 

 same time regretted the untractable nature of the 



