368 SCIENCE FROM AN EASY CHAIR 



done to a population by the habitual use of opium. At 

 the same time, there is no one who knows anything 

 about medicine and the use of drugs who does not speak 

 of opium with reverence and even affection. Forty years 

 ago, at a dinner-party where the leading physicians of 

 London were present, it was suggested that they should 

 each write down in order of merit the ten drugs to which 

 they attached the greatest value. I heard from one who 

 was present that they all put opium in the first place, 

 and that mercury, iodide of potassium, and ipecacuanha 

 followed in that order in the majority of the lists. The 

 value of opium as a medicinal agent is one thing ; its 

 deadly effect on those who have become victims to its 

 daily use is another. The origin of the medicinal use of 

 opium can be traced to Egypt in Pliny's time, but 

 beyond that nothing is known. 



As I am writing of botanical matters, I may briefly 

 refer to an ambiguity about the names "banana" and 

 " plantain." There is no difference (as is sometimes 

 suggested) between the fruits indicated by these two 

 words. Our word " plantain " is merely a corruption 

 of the Spanish word platano, which is the name of 

 the plane-tree. It was loosely applied in South America 

 by the Spanish colonists to the banana palm (Musa 

 sapientuni)) just as they called the North American bison 

 a buffalo, and as the Anglo-Americans call a stag an elk, 

 and a red thrush a robin. The banana palm is not an 

 American tree, but was introduced there from the East 

 Indies by the early navigators, and was very soon culti- 

 vated by the South American Indians as well as by the 

 colonists. There have been great authorities for in- 

 stance, Humboldt who have believed that there is a 

 native South American banana palm as well as an East 

 Indian one ; but the definite conclusion of botanists, after 

 careful inquiry, is that there is only one species, and that 



