IROQUOIS HERBALISM — FENTON 523 



tion of men and women, he thought productive of a hardy race whose 

 women suffered few miscarriages and endured childbirth unattended 

 in a seckided hut and whose men inured to warfare and dancing were 

 vigorous and seldom neurotic. Himself an advocate of the use of spe- 

 cial remedies for each disease, Rush questioned the value of Indian 

 specifics on the grounds of secrecy — such medicines cease to work cures 

 when the formulae are known — and the undifferentiated nature of 

 Indian society which did not permit a hunter-warrior to give his entire, 

 abstracted attention to herbalism. He insisted that Indians fail with 

 the wrong remedies; and he questioned the antivenereal qualities of 

 Lobelia sp. L., Geanothus sp. L. (New Jersey tea), and Ranunculus 

 (?) which Kalm had reported. Dr. Hand had informed him that the 

 Indians around Fort Pitt employed a plentiful decoction of the pine 

 tree, but that they sometimes died. He noted that the Indians had 

 acquired from the whites the art of phlebotomy, which he dogmati- 

 cally defended in his own practice, and in contrast he concluded, as if 

 to purge the materia medica of his time, "We have no discoveries in 

 the materia medica to hope for from the Indians of North America." 



Despite this judgment Rush was still open to conviction a number of 

 years afterward. On May 2, 1791, he transmitted a list of questions 

 concerning matters of health and medicine among the Indians through 

 the Secretary of War, to be asked by Colonel Pickering on his mission 

 to the Six Nations.^® 



To summarize this discussion of white borrowings from Indian 

 medicine, we offer a partial list of the more important medicinal 

 plants used among the Iroquois. Notwithstanding Rush's prediction 

 to the contrary, some of these have been retained in the U. S. Dis- 

 pensatory: Maidenhair fern {Adiantum pedatum> L.), ground pine 

 {LyGopodium ohscurum L.), white pine {Pinus strohus L.), hemlock 

 {Tsuga canadensis (L.) Carr.), Indian turnip {Arisaema triphyllurti 

 (L.) Schott.), sweet flag {Acorus calamus L.), in singing; Indian poke 

 {Veratrum viride Ait) for catarrh; bellwort {Uvularia perfoliata 

 L.), blue flag {Iris versicolor L.), sweet gale fern {Myrica aspleni- 

 folia L.), used by Mohawks for toothache (Kalm) ; white oak bark 

 {Quercus alba L.), an astringent; slippery elm {Uhnus fulva Michx.) 

 in childbirth; wild ginger {Asarum canadense L.) in fevers; and the 

 dyeplant, poke weed {Phytolacca americanalj.). Several members of 

 the crowfoot family were borrowed: Goldthread {Goptis trifolia (L.) 

 Salisb.), goldenseal {Hydrastis canadensis L.), Canada anemone 

 {Anemone canadensis L.), and black cohosh, snakeroot {Gimicifuga 

 racemosa (L.) ^\xit.) (pi. 4, fig. 1). Mnja'pi^le {Podophyllum peltatum 



*« Pickering Papers (historical index), Coll. Massachusetts Hist. Soc. Boston, ger. 6. 

 vol. 8, p. 233; Pickering Papers (ms), vol. 61, folios. 183, 302 [with answers]. See also 

 Rush, Benjamin, in Dictionary Amer. Biogr., vol. 16, pp. 227-231. 



