PHARMACOPCIAL VEGETABLE DRUGS. 
tioned in the Arabian Nights (88); e. g., “going up to Gharib, blew 
the powdered Bhang into his nostrils, till he lost his senses.” (Burton 
edition, vol. vii, p. 76. History of Gharib and His Brother.) Imported 
into Europe preceding 1690, it passed into disuse until N apoleon’s 
expedition to Egypt (1809-10), when it was again revived by De Sacy 
and Bouger. Its introduction into European medicine followed (1838- 
39) the experiments of O’Shaughnessy in Calcutta (484), since which 
date cannabis and its resin have received a place in most pharmaco- 
peias. From the beginning of East Indian history hemp has been 
smoked as a narcotic intoxicant, and when surreptitiously added to 
sweetmeats and foods, has in Oriental life been employed as a narcotic 
with the utmost recklessness. This is shown in the exaggerations of 
the Arabian Nights, which portrays so many life habits of those times. 
This writer found hashish of several qualities in the bazaars of Asia 
Minor and in Constantinople, one specimen ‘‘extra fine hashish” cost- 
ing in a Constantinople bazaar over two dollars an ounce. 
CANTHARIS (CANTHARIDES) 
Spanish Flies (Cantharis vesicatoria). This once popular reme:- 
dial agent has lost its position in modern medication. Its use came 
hand in hand with medieval medical cruelty, and was an heirloom of 
ancient heroic medication. Hippocrates (B. C. 375-400) valued can- 
tharides in dropsy and also in amenorrhea, and it goes without ques- 
tion that a substance so heroic in its action would once have been 
popular in both domestic and professional American medication. Its 
use in erysipelas and as a plaster, and to “draw the nervous energy 
and the circulating fluid” to the surface, and “thus again relieve irri- 
tation and inflammation of internal parts,” are relics of quite recent 
American medical authority, all writers in good reputation (Regular) 
commending it highly. At present, however, cantharis is in such dis- 
favor as to make it a novelty for a cantharis plaster to be prescribed 
by a modern physician of any school, and to ignore its use is no longer 
a mark of heresy. _ This change from extreme popularity to practical 
disuse has come within the experience of this writer. 
CAPSICUM 
_ This drug, Capsicum fastigiatum, is of American origin, its home 
ena? in the West Indies, Mexico, and other tropical countries of 
erica i 
can medicine. It was introduced into the Pharm 
cipally in the form of a tincture, and is now a m 
medicas throughout the world. By far the largest amount of capsicum, 
however, is consumed in culinary directions. 
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