pallida. Pedunciilus petiolis 



plura, terminalis magnus. Rhizoma longe repens, nodulosum. 



Hab. Central China. Hupeh, Fang and Hsingshan, A. Henry. 



Of these varieties, var. Ginseng is the source of Manchurian 

 Ginseng, var. repens of the larger part of Japanese Ginseng, and 

 var. 7iotoginseng of that of South China. The rest, excepting the 

 American type, are of no known economic value. 



Nothing of value to us is to be gained by an examination of 

 the botanical works published in Europe before A.D. 1700. 

 Ginseng root was known by its great repute in China, but the 

 leaves and flowers of the plant were generally quite incorrectly 

 represented. The first important contribution was made by the 

 Jesuit missionary Jartoux, who in 1709 was employed by the 

 Emperor of China to make a map of his domains. This Emperor, 

 it may be added, was a Manchu, and his house first sat on the 

 throne of China in 1644, having conquered it from Manchuria. 

 Part of the royal revenue of the new Manchu emperors came from 

 a monopoly of the Ginseng trade, the emperor reserving to himself 

 the right of trading in the Manchurian drug. Jartoux describes 

 his meeting with an army of 10,000 Tartars collecting Ginseng 

 for the emperor {Phil. Trans. Rag. Soc, {abridged) vi., p. 58). 

 '•These herbarists," he says, "carry with them neither tents nor 

 beds, everyone being sufficiently loaded with his provision, which 

 is only millet parched in an oven. So that they are constrained 

 to sleep under trees, having only their branches and barks, if they 

 can find them, for their covering." Each collector was employed 

 on the condition that he " should give His Majesty two ounces of 

 the best, and that the rest should be paid for according to its 

 weight in fine silver. It was computed that by this means the 

 emperor would get this year, 1709, about 20,000 Chinese pounds 

 of it, which would not cost him above one-fourth part of its 

 value." 



Jartoux adds that the district producing the Ginseng was fenced 

 off and guarded by a patrol, lest the Chinese should break in on 

 the monopoly, "their greediness after gain inciting them to 

 do so " ; and that writers who affirmed that Ginseng grew else- 

 where in China were mistaken. In the last statement he must 

 have been in error, for 60 years after it was reported from South 

 China by another traveller— Osbeck {Voyage to China, i., p. 223). 



The royal monopoly does not exist now ; but a temporary 

 prohibition against the importation of American roots made some 

 sixty years later, and the present cultivation in the Royal Hunting 

 Park north of Pekin of a certain very highly priced kind, are 

 probably the outcome of it. 



Jartoux strangely prophesied the discovery of Ginseng in 

 Canada ; he described its habitat in China accurately, and added, 

 " all this makes me believe that if it is to be found in any country 

 in the world, it may be particularly in Canada, where the forests 

 and mountams, according to the relation of them who have lived 

 there, very much resemble these here." A French missionary, 



