CHAPTER I. 



RHUBARB — ITS CULTIVATION AND HOME. 



A Fragment of History. — The cultivation of rhubarb, 

 like some well established laws, extends back to the time 

 when the memory of man runneth not to the contrary. 



The value of the root as a drug has long been known, 

 so long, in fact, that the discoverer of its medicinal 

 qualities will never be known, and his name must lie 

 hidden in the misty shadows of the past. Its record, 

 however, is almost contemporaneous with the earliest 

 written history as it is described in the Chinese herbal 

 Pen-King supposedly dating back to nearly 3000 B. C. 



For ages its cultivation was confined to its native 

 home, China, but in a prepared form finding its way to 

 various parts of the world. The cultivation extended 

 into India to some extent and India rhubarb finally 

 became an established article of commerce. 



It remained for Russia, upon the establishment of 

 trade relations with China, to get control of the trade, 

 and to so supervise and improve the methods of prep- 

 aration that Russian rhubarb became famous the world 

 over and its price per pound was nearly three times that 

 of opium. 



The cultivation was finally begun in Siberia and 

 along the Volga from whence it was introduced into 

 England in 1573 and later into France. No attention, 

 however, was paid to the leaf stalks, which presumably 

 were inferior in size and quality to the product of to- 



