TUBER CHINiE. 713 



great was the reputation of the new drug, that the small quantities 

 bst brought to Malacca were sold at the rate of 10 crowns per ffanta, 

 a weight of 24 ounces. 



Possibly the drug found its way to Europe even before that year, 

 for we find a careful description of it in the posthumous works ^ of 

 Valerius Cordus and Walther Ryff ^ states in 1548 that the 3'oot was 

 brought a few years ago to Venice. 



The reported good effects of China root on the Emperor Charles V. 

 who was suffering from gout, acquired for the drug a great celebrity in 

 Europe, and several works ^ were written in praise of its virtues. But 

 though its powers were soon found to have been greatly over-rated, 

 it still retained some reputation as a sudorific and alterative, and 

 was much used at the end of the 17th century in the same way 

 as sarsaparilla. It still retains a place in some modern pharma- 

 copceias. ' 



Description—The plant produces stout fibrous roots, here and 

 there thickened into large tubers, which when dried become the drug 

 China root. These tubers, as found in the market, are of irregularly 

 cylindrical form, usually a little flattened, sometimes producing short 

 knobby branches. They are from about 4 to 6 or more mches in 

 length, and 1 to 2 inches in thickness, covered with a rusty-coloured, 

 rather shining bark, which in some specimens is smooth and m othera 

 inore or less wrinkled. They have no distinct traces of rudimentarj 

 Jeaves, which however are perceptible on those of some allied species. 

 Some still retain portions of the cord-like woody runners on which 

 they grew ; the bases of a few roots can also be observed, ifte tuoei-s 

 mostly show marks of having been trimmed with a knite. 



China root is inodorous and almost insipid. ^ ^''^f ^'^'^ ,V a vJ 

 exhibits the interior as a dense granular substance ot a pale 

 colour. 



^ Microscopic Structure-The outermost cortical layer is^^^^^^^^^ 

 of brown, thick-walled cells, tangentially ^^tended mj 

 l^umerous tufts of needle-shaped crystals of calcium «^« f ^f f^ tuier 

 brown masses of resin. Thi bark is at once ^^^<^<!'^^^ J\^^^^ iin- 

 parenchyine which conti-asts strongly with it, consisting o s^^ ^^^^ 

 called, porous cells which are completely go^'g^'^J^J,^ 'jf The starch 

 and there contain colouring matter and bundles ot ^^s^^ed and angular 

 granules are large (up to 50 mkm.), sphenad, ^^^^ J^f^^bibit a radiate 

 J-oni mutual px^ssuri. Like those of colchicum they exlj .^^ 



hdum : very frequently they liave burst and run t?g«^^^^'4, bundles 

 consequence of the tubers having been f'^^'^'''*^-,, ^"...^ i^rse scalarlform 

 scattered through the parenchyme, contain «««^'^{i,';Y„ailnchyme, and 

 o[ reticulated vWls.l string of delicate th^^-;;^^ C. J,es. 

 degant wood-cells with distinct incrusting layeis and ^^ j^^_^ ^^^^ 



^ Chemical Composition-The drug is ««*; f °^„' ^^ .-eferrcd. We 

 substance to which its supposed medicinal viitues a 



V Fnhtola rationen, modumque pro 

 ^ ' Edit, by Conrad Ge.uer, fol. 212 of the ^^-^^'"^S Chy.nac [sic •'] ''«°^''. '//'! 

 ^«A quoted in tlie Aj-penJix. , ^"1" f • ™S.iw '« f'«™'«« ^- ""^""' 



Ch,m Wurzburg, 154S. 4°. ''"" '"' 



rhe earliest of wliich is by AniUeas 



