82 POLYGALE^. 



Savanilla or New Granada Rhatany. The plant yielding it is 

 Krameria tomentosa St. Hil. (Kr. Ixina var. /3 granafensis Triana, 

 Kr. grandifolia Berg), a shrub 4 to 6 feet high covering large arid 

 tracts in the valley of Jiron between Pamplona and the Magdalena in 

 New Granada, in which locality the collection of the root was observed 

 by Weir in 1864/ According to Triana it also grows at Socorro, south 

 of Jiron, The same plant is found near Santa Marta and Rio Hacha 

 in north-eastern New Granada, in British Guiana, and in the Brazilian 

 provinces of Pernambuco and Goyaz. 



The stem or root-crown of Savanilla rhatany is never so knotty 

 and irregular as that of the Peruvian drug, nor are the roots so long or 

 so thick. Separate pieces of root of sinuous form, 4 to 6 inches long 

 and yV *o -To of ^^ irich thick are most frequent. The drug is moreover 

 well distinguished by its dull purpliish brown colour, its thick smooth 

 bark marked with longitudinal furrows, and here and there with deep 

 transverse cracks, and by the bark not easily splitting off as it does in 

 common rhatany. 



The anatomical difference depends chiefly upon the more abundant 

 development of the bark which in thickness is ^ to :^ the diameter of 

 the wood. In Peruvian rhatany the cortical layer attains only ^ to ^ of 

 the diameter of the woody column. The greater firmness of the 

 suberous coat in Savanilla rhatany is due to its cells being densely filled 

 with colouring matter. 



Savanilla rhatany differs from the Peruvian root in its tannic matter. 

 This becomes evident by shaking the powdered root (or bark) with water 

 and iron reduced by hydrogen. The liquid filtered from the Savanilla 

 sort and diluted with distilled water exhibits an intense violet colour, 

 that from Peruvian rhatany a dingy brown ; the latter turns light red 

 by alkalis. Thin sections of the Peruvian root assume a greyish hue 

 when moistened with a ferrous salt ; Savanilla root by a similar treat- 

 ment displays the above violet colour. The Savanilla root is richer in 

 soluble matter and from the greater development of its bark may deserve 

 to be preferred for medicinal use. 



In the English market, Savanilla root is of less frequent occurrence 

 than that of Para. 



A kind of rhatany attributed to Krameria secundiflora DC., a 

 herbaceous plant of Mexico, Texas and Arkansas, was furnished to Berg 

 in 1854, but has not been in commerce. Its anatomical structure has 

 been described by Berg.^ 



^ Hanbury, Origin of Savanilla Rhatany, a conclusion in which, after careful re-ex- 



in Pharm. Journ. vi. (1865) 460. — Also amination of specimens, I fully agree. — 



Science Papers, 333. — In that paper I re- D. H. 



ferred the drug to a variety of Kr. Ixina Fig. of Kr. Ixina in Bentley and Trimen, 



which M. Cotton has shown to differ in no Med. PI. part 10. 

 respect from St. Hilaire's Kr. tomentosa, ^ Bot. Zeitung, 14th Nov. 1856. 797 



