268 PHARMACOPEIAL DRUGS 



through which it reached the market from its native 

 land. As a drastic cathartic and a laxative this drug is 

 used in large amounts, having been long accepted as a 

 household remedy in syrup and tincture form the world 

 throughout. Rhubarb is one of the great gifts of empiri- 

 cism to the medical profession. Fllickiger naturally 

 gives this drug detailed care, as is true also of Dymock, 

 in his Pharmacographia Indica. From these two great 

 publications we condense as follows: 



"HISTORY. In the great Geography of China it is 

 stated that rhubarb was a tribute of the province Si- 

 ning-fu, from about the 7th to the 10th centuries of our 

 era. 



"As regards Western Asia and Europe, we find a 

 root called pa or prjov, mentioned by Dioscorides as 

 brought from beyond the Bosphorus. The same drug 

 is alluded to in the fourth century by Ammianus Mar- 

 cellinus, who states that it takes its name from the 

 river Rha (the modern Volga), on whose banks it grows. 

 Pliny describes a root termed Rhacoma, which when 

 pounded yielded a colour like that of wine but inclining 

 to saffron, and was brought from beyond Pontus. 



"The drug thus described is usually regarded as rhu- 

 barb, or at least as the root of some species of Rheum, 

 but whether produced in the regions of the Euxine 

 (Pontus) or merely received from remoter countries, is 

 a question that can not be solved. 



"It is, however, certain that the name Radix pontica 

 or Rha ponticum used by Scribonius Largus and Celsus 

 was applied in allusion to the region whence the drug was 

 received. Lassen has shown that trading caravans 

 from Shensi in Northern China arrived at Bokhara as 



