PHARMACOPCIAL VEGETABLE DRUGS. 
(254a), barberry is authoritatively recognized. — The natives of India 
use an extract made from various species growing in Northern India, 
this extract being sold in the bazaars under the name Rusot, and used 
not only in affections of the eye, but as a tonic and febrifuge. | The 
qualities of both the official drug and its foreign relatives are similar 
and were introduced by the common people. 
BUCHU 
The Hottentots of the Cape of Good Hope used the leaves of the 
Buchu plant (Barosma betulina) as a domestic remedy, and from 
them the colonists of the Cape of Good Hope derived their information 
concerning it. Reece (540) and Company, London, 1821, first im- 
ported it and introduced it to pharmacy and to the medical profession, 
where, as well as in private formule and domestic practice, it has ever 
since enjoyed more or less notoriety. Perhaps no “patent” American 
medicine has ever enjoyed greater notoriety than, about 1860, did the 
decoction of the leaves under the term “Helmbold’s Buchu,” which, 
a weak alcoholic decoction, commanded one dollar for a six-ounce vial, 
and sold in car-load lots. During the crusade of this preparation the 
medical profession of America, probably inspired by the press com- 
ments, prescribed buchu very freely. It is still in demand and is still 
favored as a constituent of remedies recommended to the laity. 
CALAMUS 
The use of Calamus, Acorus calamus, in the domestic medication 
of India, is recorded from the very earliest times. It is sold commonly 
in the bazaars, and Ainslie (7) in his Materia Medica of Hindoostan, 
1813, states that in consequence of its great value in the bowel com- 
plaints of children, a severe penalty was placed on the refusal of any 
druggist to open his door in the night to sell calamus, when demanded. 
The antiquity of its use is shown from the fact that it was one of the 
constituents of the ointment Moses was commanded to make for use 
in the Tabernacle, (Ex. xxx), while the prophet Ezekiel says of the 
commerce of Tyre, “Bright iron, cassia, and calamus were in thy mar- 
ket.” Theophrastus (633) mentions calamus, and Celsus (136), nearly 
two thousand years ago, refers to it as a drug from India. In the six- 
teenth century Amatus Lusitanus (16a) reports it as imported into 
Venice, and in 1692 Rheede (547) figures it as an Indian plant under 
the name Vacha, the same name being still applied to it on the Malabar 
Coast. From its tropical home calamus has spread until it is now found 
in all temperate climates suitable for its growth, the market supply com- 
ing mainly from Southern Russia, through Germany. The thera- 
peutic use of calamus in pharmacy and licensed medicine is, as with 
other like substances, a gift of empiricism founded in the far distant 
past. 
CALENDULA 
Marigold, Calendula officinalis, has been known, practically, from 
the beginning of documentary records in scientific or medicinal lines. 
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