314 PHARMACOPEIAL DRUGS 



"He himself had been witness of the cure of hydro- 

 phobia by the use of this plant alone, and that there are 

 a number of gentlemen of the most respectable charac- 

 ters in New York, who will attest that they have been 

 witnesses of repeated cures by the same remedy. He 

 also Confirms the account given in the above letter. 

 The Rev. Dr. Cutler (Manasseh Cutler) also has re- 

 ceived verbal information, which he considers as con- 

 firmatory of the above important particulars . ' ' Thacher. 



Reference is made to these facts in Thacher's New 

 Dispensatory, 1810, long descriptions being given in 

 detail. In the revised edition, 1821, Dr. Thacher, after 

 making his special study of the disease, condenses the 

 article, abandons the verbatim reproduction from the 

 current press, but emphasizes the value of scutellaria 

 in the treatment of hydrophobia, in the following posi- 

 tive language: 



"The medical properties ascribed to scullcap are 

 those of an antidote against the effect of canine mad- 

 ness. In a publication entitled Observations on Hydro- 

 phobia, by the compiler of this work, a mass of evidence 

 in favor of the antidotal powers of this plant has been 

 recorded. Numerous gazettes and journals have also 

 teemed with encomiums on its preventive powers, and 

 from sources so respectable as to claim attention and 

 confidence; and where it has been most known and em- 

 ployed, it has been the most highly extolled. Dr. Van 

 Derveer, late of New Jersey, being in possession of the 

 secret, acquired extensive popularity by his success; 

 and he is said to have declared, that during his practice 

 he has prevented upwards of three hundred persons 

 from going mad, and that he never lost but one patient 

 to whom his medicine had been administered. From the 



