SANGUIS DRACONIS. 



fiTi 



I 



which the principal criterion regarded by the dealers is colour. Some 

 of the inferior sorts make only a dull brick-red mark when rubbed on 

 paper, and have an earthy-looking fracture. The sticks moreover do 

 not take the impression of the enveloping leaf as when they are more 

 purely resinous. A sample of inferior Reed Dragon's Blood afforded 

 us 40 per cent, of matter, insoluble in spirit of wine. 



Other sorts of Dragon's Blood. 



Draff oil's Blood of Socotra — We have already stated (p. G72) that 

 the Cinnabar mentioned by Dioscorides was brought from Africa. That 

 the term really designated dragon's blood seems evident from the fact 

 that the author of the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea,^ written circa a.d. 

 54-68, names it (Kiwd^api) as a production of the island of Dioscorida, 

 the ancient name of Socotra. 



The Arabians, as Abu Hanifa and Ibn Baytar,' describe dragon's 

 blood as brought from Socotra, giving to the drug the very name by 

 which it is kno^^^l to the Arabs at the present day, namely, Dam-ul- 

 akh-wain. Barbosa (1514) as well as Giovanni di Barros^ mention it 

 as a production of the island : and in our own times it has been noticed 

 by Wellstead,^ Vaughan,^ and A. von Kremer.^ It is now but little 

 collected. Vaughan states, as well as Von Wrede, that the tree is 

 found in Hadramaut and on the east coast of Africa. The latter state- 

 ment is also made in letters (1877, 1878), with which we were favoured 

 by Captain Hunter of Aden and Hildebrandt of Berlin (see pages 140 

 and 141), by the latter of whom we were presented with a photographic 

 sketch of the tree growing in the Somali country, at elevations of 

 from 2500 to 5500 feet, and called therfe Moli. It is Draccena sckizantha 

 Baker,'' a tree attaining 8 metres in height. The resin has an acidulous 

 taste, and is, according to Hildebrandt, not exported, but occasionally 

 eaten by the Somalis. The tree from which dragon's blood is collected 

 in Socotra is, according to Capt. Hunter, Draccena Ornbet Kotschy. 



The Drojy Dragon's Blood, of which small parcels imported from 

 Bombay or Zanzibar occasionally appear in the London market, is 

 however this drug. It is in small tears and fragments, seldom exceed- 

 ing an inch in length, has a clean glassy fracture, and in thin pieces is 

 transparent and of a splendid ruby coloiir. From Sumatran dragon's 

 blood it may be distinguished by not containing the little shell-like 

 scales constantly present in that drug, and by not evolving when heated 

 on the point of a knife the irritating fumes of benzoic acid. 



Dragon's Blood of the Canary Islands — This substance is afforded 

 by Draccena Draco L., a liliaceous tree^ resembling a Tncca, of which 

 the famous specimen at Orotava in Teneriffe has often been described 

 on account of its gigantic dimensions and venerable age.' 



^ Voyage of Nearchus and Periplus of the 

 Erythrean Sen, translated by Vincent, Ox- 

 ford, 1S09. 90. 



2 Sontheimer's ed. i. 104. 426. ii. 117. 



' L'Asia, sec. deca. Venet. 1561. p. 10. a. 



* Travels in Arabia, Lond. 1838. ii. 449. 



^ Pharm. Journ. xii. (1853) 385. 



'^ Aegiipten, Leipzig, 1863. 



' On Hildebrandt's East African Plants, 

 Journ. ofBot. xv. (1877) 71. 



^Histological observations on the struc- 

 ture of the stem, accompanied by excellent 

 figures, will be found in a memoir by Eau- 

 yfen\io'S{Bijdrage tot de kennis van Dracce^ta 

 Draco, pp. 55. tabb. 5) in the Verhand d. 

 Kon. Acad. v. Wetensch., afd. Jfatuiirl: 

 X. 1863. 



*It was destroyed in 1867 by a hurri- 

 cane. 



