io6 THE USES OF PLANTS. 



GENTIANE^:. 



Gentiana lutea, L., yields the bitter tonic GENTIAN- 

 ROOT, which has long been much used in medicine. 

 It is collected in the mountains of Switzerland, and 

 other parts of Central and Southern Europe.* 



Ophelia Chirata, Griseb., ' CHIRETTA ' of India, a 

 valuable bitter tonic, was admitted to the Edinburgh 

 Pharmacopoeia in 1839. When cheap it is substituted 

 for gentian in cattle foods.f 



CORDIACE/E. 



Cordia Boissieri, DC., ANACAHUITE-WOOD, was im- 

 ported about 1860, from Tampico, in Mexico, as a 

 remedy for consumption.! 



CONVOLVULACEyE. 



Convolvulus Scammonia, L., SCAMMONY, a native of 

 the Levant, has a milky juice in its long tap-root, 

 which yields a gum-resin called JALAPIN, C 31 H 50 O lfl , 

 and has accordingly long been valued as a purgative. 

 The same substance probably occurs in the KALA- 

 DANA RESIN, obtained from the seed of Pharbitis 

 Nil, Choisy, which is officinal in India, as it certainly 

 does in the roots of Ipomcea. 



The true JALAP is the tuber of Ipomcea Purga, 

 Hayne, a native of the Mexican Andes, growing at 

 altitudes of from 5,000 to 8,000 feet, near Xalapa, from 

 which place it takes its name, and imported from 

 Vera Cruz to the extent of over eighty tons annually. 



* Bentley and Trimen, iii., pi. 182. 



f Ibid., pi. 183. R. Bentley, ' Pharm. Journ.,' v (1874), P- 

 481 ; * Pharmacographia, 3 p. 392. 



\ 'Pharm. Journ.,' ii (1861), p. 407; iii (1861), p. 164; iv 

 (1862), p. 271. 



