EHIZOMA CALAMI AROMATICI. 077 



History — Sweet Flag root has been from the earliest times a 

 favourite medicine of the natives of India, in which country it is sold 

 in every bazaar. Ainslie^ asserts that it is reckoned so valuable in the 

 bowel complaints of children that there is a penalty incurred by any 

 druggist who will not open his door in the middle of the night to sell 



it, it' demanded ! 



The descriptions of Acoron, a plant of Colchis, Galatia, Pontus, and 

 Crete, given by Dioscorides and Pliny, certainly refer to this drug. We 

 think that the KJXa,uo? apojpLaTiKS? of Dioscorides, which he states to 

 grow in India, is the same, though Roylc regards it as an Andropofjov. 

 Thp KaAa/xo? of Theophrastus and the Calamus of the English Bible ^ 

 are considered by some authors to refer to the Sweet Flag. 



Celsus in the first century mentioned Calamus Ahxandnnus, the 

 drug being probably then brought from India by way of the Red Sea. 

 We know by the testimony of Amatus Lusitanus' that in the IGth 

 century it used to be so imported into Venice. Rheede,' moreover, 

 described and figured Acorns Calamus as an Indian plant under the 

 name Vacha, which it still bears on the Malabar Coast. But m the 

 pharmaceutical tariff of the German town of Halberstadt of the year 

 1697, " Calamus aromaticus verus, Indianiscker Calmus," and "Cala- 

 mus aromaticus nostras" common Calmus, are quotedat exacJy the 

 same price,' and Murray ^^ states expressly that in his time (1/JU) 

 Asiatic calamus was still met with in the pharmacies of Continental 

 Europe, but that it had mostly been replaced by the home-grown drug. 

 At the present time the Calamus aromaticus of commerce is l^uropcan 

 in all essential characters it agrees with that of India, a package oi 

 which is now and then offered in the London drug sales. 



Collection-The London market is supplied from_ Germany, whither 

 the drug is brought, we believe, from Southern Russia. It is no ^n er 

 collected in England,-at least in quantity, though it used to be gathered 

 some years ago in Norfolk. 



Description-The rootstock of sweet flag P^^^'\Z.^ZrhZ 

 tortuous, subcylindrical or flattened pieces, a few niches If^g, and rom 



\ to 1 inch in greatest diameter. Each piece is o^^^^^^^yj",;, „„aer 

 the upper surface with the scars, often hairy, of leaves and on the imdei 



with a zigzag line of little, elevated, dot-like ^"g^ "^^^-f ^/l^ froni 

 The rootslock is usually ^ough and shruuken, Tf^^^S ^^,',tkv fi^- 

 dark brown to orange-brown! breaking easily with a ^^^i,^ f ^^^J,^^^, 

 ture, and exhibiting a pale brown spongy interior. The odoui is 

 aromatic and agreeable ; the taste, bitterish and P"^S^"^;. jjj^], 



The fresh footstock is brownish-red or g^"^^"^^^^' ^^^^^^'tolerab y 

 within, and of a spongy texture. Its transverse sec i^i^.^^^^^^ 

 uniform ; a fine line (medullary sheath) separates the oute ^^^^^^ 

 the lighter central part, the diameter of which is tsMce or tniee 

 the width of the former. , . ^^ „,, ^f 



Microscnnir Strnrtnre-The outermost layer is niade up 



^ Mat. Med. oflllndoodan, Madras, 1813. \ ^J^Cki^So^umTn\^^^^^ pagc562). 



xxv??q \^^- r^ ' *^'"V*;>; I* \^o^^' '^^'^ Apparatus Medkaminum, v. 40. 



^"Yii- ly.— See also page 715, footnote 2. ^/^y^^- 



In Diosr^ de Mat, Med. Unar rat tones, 

 Argeut. 1554. 33. 



