~ INTRODUCTION. 
THE present work has been undertaken with the impression that it would prove acceptable to numerous Students, 
Physicians, and Pharmaceutists in the United States. Two excellent illustrated treatises devoted to the indigenous 
Materia Medica have been given to the public,* but none of a general character embracing exotic productions have 
been presented, and such as are of European origin are either so expensive or so little known as to be restricted for the 
most part to the libraries of institutions, or to those of individuals especially cultivating this branch of Medical Science. 
Medical Botany has been neglected in this country, not on account of its destitution of interest, nor from the idea of 
its little importance, but because the facilities of readily prosecuting its study have not been supplied, more particularly 
In the way of delineation. The connexion between Materia Medica and Botany, is well understood ; there is an in- 
debtedness of the former to the latter, and a dependence, either for the means of distinguishing between articles or of 
augmenting their number, too well settled to be controverted. ‘The Dispensatories and Treatises on the Materia 
Medica are filled with technically descriptive accounts of plants ; in some of them even a botanical arrangement or classi- 
fication has been adopted. As such minuteness of detail is met with in the books upon the subject, with respect to the 
sources of the vegetable substances, and as these details are essential to complete the history of them, it is hardly 
necessary to amplify upon the importance of understanding them. Where an inability so to do occurs, it must be a matter 
of regret to the individual, and cannot arise from any undervaluation of the subject. Under present circumstances this 
inability is too common. Preliminary knowledge can only be acquired from lectures or from books of an elementary 
character, and the principles having been once mastered, further difficulty 1 is not experienced, as the key is in posses- 
sion which unlocks the mysticism of the language in which the usual descriptions are couched. 
Apart from the expediency of merely comprehending what is written in the books upon the department, hs advan- -» 
tages and gratification experienced by one who has an insight into this scientific mode of description, exemplification, 
and arrangement will induce him further to pursue it. A wide field of research is opened, to be cultivated with infinite 
profit to himself, and should opportunity present, with benefit to science itself. Nature is spread open on all sides, and 
many an Mertasity of contributing to the open of truths much sought for and desired, has been lost from 
an aeenty to appropriate it. 
- Considerable changes have been thade of late years in the modes of instruction. The existing age may be said to be one 
: f illustration. The plan has at length been resorted to, of conveying information to the mind by impressing the senses, 
nd demonstration has been substituted for long, bare, obscure description. ‘T'o be successful, a lecturer must now have at 
ommand, the means of presenting to his — the visible objects or ae 50 ane of them, about which he 
tions of Medical Plants. This will answer the cos of the teacher and oe aid the listener for the time 
* The Asatticin Matoal Botany of Dr. Bigelow, and Vegetable Materia Medica of the United ‘Boks. by Dr. W. P. C. Barton. 
a a ; ¥ , 2 c 
