80 MENISPERMACEvE. 



by another sort consisting exclusively of stems which are devoid of 

 bitterness and appear to be wholly inert. They are in the form of sticks 

 or truncheons, mostly cylindrical. Cut traversely, they display the 

 same structure as the sort last described, with a well-defined pith. The 

 wood is light in weight, of a dull tint, and disposed to split. The bark, 

 which consists of two layers, is easily detached. 



3. Stems of Chondodendron tomentosum R. et P. — These have 

 been recently imported from Brazil, and sold as Pareira Brava} The 

 drug consists of truncheons about 1\ f^et in length, of a rather rough 

 and knotty stem, from 1 to 4 inches thick.^ The larger pieces, which 

 are sometimes hollow with age, display, when cut traversely, a small 

 number (.5 — 9) nearly concentric woody zones. The youngest pieces 

 have the bark dotted over with small dark warts. 



The wood is inodorous, but has a bitterish taste like the root, of 

 which it is probably an efficient representative. Some pieces have 

 portions of root springing from them, and detached roots occur here 

 and there among the bits of stem. The structure and development of 

 the latter has been elaborately examined and figured by Moss,^ and 

 also by Lanessan,'' in the French translation of our book. 



4. White Pareira Brava — Stems and roots of Ahuta omfescens 

 Aublet. — Mr. J. Correa de Mello of Campinas has been good enough to 

 send to one of us (H.) a specimen of the root and leaves ' of this plant, 

 marked Parreira Brava grande. The former we have identified with 

 a drug received from Rio de Janeiro as Ahutua U7iha de Vaca, i.e. Coiv- 

 Jioof Abutua, and also with a similar drug found in the London market. 

 Aublet ® states that the r6ot of Ahida rufescens was, in the time of his 



_ visit to French Guiana, shipped from that colony to Europe as Pareira 

 Brava Blanc (White Pareira Brava). 



This name is well applicable to the drug before us, which consists of 

 short pieces of a root, -| an inch to 3 inches thick, covered with a rough 

 blackish bark, and also of bits of stem having a pale, striated, corky 

 bark. Cut transversely, the root displays a series of concentric zones of 

 white amylaceous cellular tissue, each beautifully marked with narrow 

 wedge-shaped medullary rays of dark, porous tissue. The wood of the 

 stem is harder than that of the 'root, the medullary rays are closej- 

 together and broader, and there is a distinct pith. 



The wood, neither of root nor .stem, has any taste or smell. A 

 decoction of the root is turned bright blue by iodine. 



5. Yellow Pareira Brava — This drug, of which a quantity was in 

 the hands of a London drug-broker in 1873, is, we presume, the Pareira 

 Brava jaune of Aublet — the bitter tasting stem of his "Ahuta amara 

 folio levi cordiformi ligno flavescente," — a plant of Guiana unknown to 

 recent botanists. That which we have seen consists of portions of a 

 hard woody stem, from 1 to 5 or 6 inches in diameter, covered with a 



^45 packages containing about 20 cwt. * Pharm. Joicrn. vi. (1876) 702. 



were offered for sale by Messrs. Lewis and * Histoire des Drogues d^origine veg^tale, 



Peat, drug-brokers, 11 Sept. 1873, but i. (Paris, 1878) 72. 



there had been earlier importations. * I have compared these leaves with 



^ From these knots, which are at regular Aublet's own specimen in the British 



intervals, and sometimes very protuberant, Museum. — D. H. 



it would appear that the panicles of flower ^ Hi^t. des Plnntes de. la Gulane Fran- 

 arise year after year. goise, i. (1775) 618. tab. 250. 



