PHARMACOPCIAL VEGETABLE DRUGS. 
introduced Conium into regular medicine. Tradition has it that the de- 
coction of this plant was the ¢adppaxov drunk by Socrates (334). 
CONVALLARIA 
Lily of the Valley, Convallaria majalis, is recorded as one of the 
earliest of domestic remedies, being accepted by Dr. Squibb (610a) 
as “continuously used in medicine for several hundred years (Ephe- 
meris, January, 1884). In The British Medical Journal, November, 
1883, Dr. Edward Drummond, of Rome, states that in a book of Com- 
mentaries on the Materia Medica of Dioscorides, Venice, 1621, Dr. 
Pietro Andrea Matthioli (414) speaks as follows of its use in cardiac 
diseases : 
The Germans use lily of the valley to strengthen the heart, the brain, and 
os < haga parts, and also give it in palpitation, vertigo, epilepsy, and apo- 
piexy, 
This article led Dr. Squibb, in connection with some private in- 
formation in a letter from ‘“‘a very careful and close observer” (Squibb), 
to favor the drug as a hopeful remedy that in specific and restricted 
directions would be better employed than digitalis. To such an extent 
was he impressed in its favor as to lead him to write (1879) : 
It is to be hoped that the revision committee will recognize it in the forth- 
coming issue of the U. S. Pharmacopeia. 
The commendations of Dr. Squibb were probably instrumental in 
obtaining for convallaria this honor, for in 1900 it obtained official 
recognition. 
In Russia convallaria was investigated by the medical profession 
as early as 1880, having long before been used in dropsy by the people. 
About 1883, as already stated, it became fashionable elsewhere, being 
generally commended as a substitute for digitalis in certain specific 
directions. 
A study of the chemistry of the drug antedated “authority” in 
medicine, for in 1858 G. F. Walz published an analysis in the N. Jahr- 
buch f. Pharm., describing two “most important constituents,” viz., 
convallarin and convallamarin. He states that his experiments were 
made long before their publication. It is to be seen that the empirical 
use of convallaria unquestionably prevailed centuries before its ex- 
ploitation as a “fashionable” remedy by the licensed profession of medi- 
cine (1883), the chemist also anticipating its probable employment in 
orthodox therapy. 
COPAIBA (COPAIFERA OFFICINALIS*) 
Copaiba (popularly known as balsam of copaiba) is obtained from 
South America, principally from Brazil and Venezuela, being produced 
by numerous species of the genus copaifera. This genus belongs to 
* ON THE SPELLING OF THE NAME COPAIFERA LANGSDORFFII. 
sensed A LETTER BY CHARLES RICE, NEW YORK, TO JOHN URI LLOYD. 
can not er to Desfontaines’ original (Mem. Mus. Paris, VII. 
to judge from the Kew Index and some other authorities, Desfontaines Bs fd ae 
mame Lansdorfii. And from Desfontaines the mistake pissed into many 
28 
