DIGITALIS 129 



biennial plant, and therefore continued to use the 

 leaves." 



Withering is also explicit in distinguishing between 

 the qualities of the leaves gathered at different seasons 

 of the year, but he does not limit the drug to the second 

 year's growth. He states that at different seasons of 

 the year the quality varies greatly, which is true of all 

 herbs. He therefore suggests that the leaves employed 

 should be those of a prime quality, gathered when the 

 plant is in flower, (which is in the second year's growth), 

 but makes no other reference whatever to either the 

 first or the second year's crop. He says: 



"The leaves I had found to vary much as to dose, at 

 different seasons of the year; but I expected, if gathered 

 always in one condition of the plant, viz., when it was 

 in flowering state, and carefully dried, that the dose 

 might be ascertained as exactly as that of any other 

 medicine." 



During the past fifteen years the writer of these 

 historical notes has cultivated more or less digitalis, 

 but, as has been said, he has failed to discover any 

 advantage that the second year's crop possesses over 

 the mature leaf of the first year, other than that there is 

 a greater number of mature leaves the second year, 

 the crop being heavier than the first year. In the orig- 

 inal European experimentation, the seed and flowers 

 were also employed in therapy, but soon passed into 

 disuse. Withering employed the leaf texture, after 

 removing the ribs and fibers. 1 



1 For detailed experiments on both cultivation and assays of Digitalis see researches 

 of Haskell, Miller, Walters, Eckler & Baker. "The LiUy Scientific Bulletins," NOB. 

 1 2, 4&5. 



