PHARMACOPGIAL VEGETABLE DRUGS. 
when necessity required, as a substitute for tobacco. The statement 
of Lewis and Clarke (381a), to the effect that the Chippewa Indians 
used the root of lobelia, refers evidently to the root of Lobelia syphi- 
litica, no record concerning the use of Lobelia inflata by the Indians 
being found in such publications as the Book of the Indians, 1837, by 
Drake (198). It was not named in Indian Medicine, by Browne (104), 
(edited by W. W. Beach, 1877) ; Long’s (393) account of the medi- 
cines and practice of the Indians of the West, 1819; Nuttall (477), 
who informed Dr. Mattson (415) that he had never known the In- 
-dians to use Lobelia inflata; Indian Captivities, though prolific as con- 
cerns the customs of the Indians; or the American Herbal, by Samuel 
Stearns, M. D. (612), 1772, which ignores Lobelia inflata, though re- 
ferring to other species of lobelia. Neither Barton (43) nor Rafi- 
nesque (535) mention Lobelia inflata, from personal experience, as 
an Indian remedy. Catlin (131a) in his Manners, Customs, and 
Condition of the North American Indians, omits the drug. However, 
Mattson (415), 1841, in his American Vegetable Practice, states that 
“there is abundant traditionary evidence that lobelia was used by the 
Penobscot Indians, long before the time of Dr. Samuel Thomson, its 
reputed discoverer, but with the exception of that tribe, I have not 
been able to discover by any researches I have made that the American 
aborigines had any knowledge of its properties or virtues.” Samuei 
Thomson (638), whose name is so closely linked with that of lobelia 
as never to be dissociated therefrom, says, “It has never occurred to 
me that it was of any value in medicine until this time (1793),” and 
also, “In the fall of 1807, I introduced lobelia, tinctured in spirit, as 
a remedy in asthma.” Mattson (415), however, 1841, insists that 
its use by the people of New England was long before Thomson’s 
time, reciting that “Mr. Phillip Owen, now eighty years old, relates 
that when a boy, he was sent into the field by his mother to collect 
some lobelia for a child, sick with quinsy, and that the herb, admin- 
istered in the usual manner, afforded speedy and entire relief.” The 
publication in which this occurs, dated 1841, shows that lobelia was 
a domestic remedy in 1770. Other evidence (see (389) Drugs and 
Medicines of North America, pp. 83-89) indicates conclusively that 
lobelia was a domestic remedy with the settlers of North America be- 
fore the day of the noted empiricist Samuel Thomson, who, however, 
gave to it the conspicuity it has enjoyed for over a hundred years. It 
is this writer’s opinion that lobelia will yet be shown to be one of 
the most valuable of all the remedies native to America, and he be- 
lieves it would now occupy that position in “Regular” medication but 
for its historical connection with their arch-enemy, Samuel Thomson. 
LYCOPODIUM 
_From the beginning of recorded time the minute spores of Lyco- 
podium (clavatum, and other species), known also to the early bot- 
anists as Muscus terrestris, or Muscus clavatus, have been commended 
for their therapeutic virtues. This plant, the common club moss, is 
found throughout Central and Northern Europe, Russian Asia, even 
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