Preface 



CHINESE physicians credit so many remedial 

 agents that a work of forty volumes is de- 

 voted to their description and an outline of 

 their uses. Dr. George Cheever Shattuck, in his 

 work "A Synopsis of Medical Treatment," gives 

 what might be called the Pharmacopeia of the 

 Massachusetts General Hospital; and it comprises 

 twenty-five pages, including therein mention of but 

 twenty-four agents derived from botanic sources. 

 There are nineteen countries with well-based 

 pharmacopeias, and they recognize five hundred 

 and fifty botanic drugs. There are seventy-eight 

 botanic drugs recognized in sixteen of these na- 

 tional standards, which covers the important list 

 in world-wide commerce. Two hundred and thirty 

 botanic drugs are recognized in but one or two 

 pharmacopeias, twenty-nine of these being found 

 only in the United States Pharmacopeia. Among 

 these latter are: Bloodroot, cottonseed oil, oil of 

 pimento, oil of chenopodium, sabal, stillingia, yerba 

 santa, crampbark, leptandra, calendula, berberis, 

 pereira, sassafras, and sumach. We attach im- 

 portance to most of these; but so does Mexico to 

 her native drugs, Japan to many that are esteemed 

 there, and India to certain tropical species. 



Each country has its own plant remedies; they 

 are, often, especially adapted to the uses of the 

 people, are readily procured at moderate cost, and 



