SUBSTANCES REPUTED MEDICINAL. 147 
poor aboriginal chiefly takes interest in the vegetation as supplying 
him with his scanty food, or as affording him fibre useful in 
securing fish and other animal sustenance. As faras we know, the 
Materia Medica of the blacks is of a very meagre description, yet 
the acquisition of even such little knowledge as they are supposed 
to possess has been slow and difficult, inasmuch as persons who 
have lived in a state of nature with them have not been 
distinguished for either their medical or botanical knowledge. 
Civilised or semi-civilised blacks frequently know but little about 
their native Materia Medica, and the difficulty of obtaining 
reliable information is enhanced (as I have experienced to a slight 
extent) through the extreme willingness of town blacks to impart 
information in regard to any plant which may be shown them, 
which impresses one with the thought that they are too willing 
to oblige. But perhaps this is mainly owing to asking them 
leading questions. 
With the native Materia Medica of India, for instance, the 
case is very different. While some remedies are evidently used 
fancifully, and others for every disease to which the human frame 
is liable, much of the knowledge in regard to it is exact, the out- 
come of intelligent observation and enquiry, and the work of the 
European practitioner to classify the native drugs is a compara- 
tively easy one. 
There is an important matter which I have often heard 
referred to by medical men and others. It may be only an 
ingenious surmise, but I am inclined to think it is more than that, 
as evidence to prove its truth is from time to time brought forward. 
It is this. Native Australian drugs will probably be found 
peculiarly efficacious in the treatment of diseases, or modifications 
of diseases, which are co-extensive with their distribution. 
The number of really useful New South Wales drugs, as far 
as our knowledge at present extends, is, as will be seen, but very 
limited, and in regard to these even, our knowledge lacks precision. 
It will thus be seen how little trodden has been this particular field 
of enquiry. Yet it is not too early even now to attempt to system- 
atise such knowledge as we possess—this has been the object in 
view in submitting the few pages which follow. 
