28 MUTIS AND HIS DISCIPLES. Chap. II. 



native of Cadiz, who was appointed to conduct a botanical 

 survey of New Granada, and especially to investigate the 

 bark of the chinchona-trees.^ 



In 1772 Mutis found these trees in the neighbourhood of 

 Bogota, and described four kinds in 1792, which he called 

 C. lancifolia, O. cordifolia, G. ohlongifolia, and C. ovalifolia, 

 yielding four kinds of barks — anaranjada, amarilla, roja, and 

 blanca, or orange-coloured, yellow, red, and white.^ He 

 declared the C. lancifolia to be excellent for intermittent 

 fevers, in which lie was right, and to be identical with the 

 C Condaminea of Loxa, in which he was wrong ; the C. cor- 

 difolia he recommended for remittent fevers, and the other 

 two for inflammatory diseases. In reality the two last are 

 not chinchonas at all, but belong to the genus Ladenbergia, 

 and contain no fever-dispelling alkaloids whatever; while 

 the C. Cordifolia is so poor in alkaloids as to be practically 

 worthless. 



While Mutis, and his disciples Caldas and Zea, were pro- 

 secuting their researches in New Granada, an expedition 

 under the botanists Ruiz and Pavon was sent to Peru ; and 

 an acrimonious paper war sprang up between the rivals, as to 

 the resj)ective merits of the barks of New Granada and Peru. 

 Ruiz declared the New Granada kinds to be inferior to those 

 of Peru, while Mutis contradicted him, and Zea^ went so far 

 as to maintain that the species found by Ruiz and Pavon in 

 Peru were mere varieties of the four chinchonas of Mutis, 

 growing near Bogota.* 



The G. lancifolia of Mutis is dispersed in wild inacces- 



' Mutis was born at Cadiz in 1732. , the Spanisli government that he was 

 He resided in South America for forty I the lirst discoverer of chiucliona-trees 

 years, and corresponded witli Linnaeus. ; in New Granada, and obtained a yearly 

 Dying in 1808, the greater portion of , pension of 2000 dollars as a reward; 



bis papers Avas destroyed in the revo- 

 lution at Bogota ; but a part of liis col- 

 lection of dried plants is now in the 

 botanical gardens at Madrid, in a dis- 

 graceful state of disorder. 



but he was afterwards considered to 

 be an impostor, and tlie viceroy de- 

 prived him of it. 



3 The pupil and fellow-workman of 

 Mutis, from wliose notes he wrote. 



- [n \1H\ Don Scliastiau Jose' Ijopez ! * Analei< de la Ristmia Natural de 

 Kuiz, a pliysician at Bogota, persuaded ' Madrid, 1800. 



