734 FILICES. 



Yet Tragus ^ remarks that, at least in Germany, the root was little 

 used. It was in fact subsequently nearly forgotten until revived by the 

 introduction of certain secret remedies for tapeworm, of which 

 powdered male fern rhizome, combined with drastic purgatives, was 

 a chief constituent. 



A medicine of this kind was prepared by Daniel Mathieu, a native 

 of Neuchatel, born in 1741, who established himself as an apothecary 

 in Berlin. His treatment for the parasite was so successful that it 

 attracted the notice of Frederick the Great, who purchased his nostrum 

 for an annuity of 200 thalers (£30), besides conferring upon him the 

 dignity of Aulic Council! or.^ 



Great celebrity was also gained for the method of treating tapeworm 

 practised by Madame Nuffler or NufFer, the widow of a surgeon at 

 Murten (Morat), likewise in Switzerland, who in 1775 obtained for the 

 secret from Louis XIV., after an inquiry by savans of the period, the 

 sum of 18,000 livres. Her method of treatment consisted in the 

 administration of — 1. Panada made of bread with a little butter. 2. 

 A clyster of salt water and olive oil. 3. The " specijlque " — simply 

 powdered fern-root. 4. A purgative bolus of calomel, gamboge, 

 acammony, and Confectio hyaeinthidis, — given in the foregoing order.* 



J. Peschier,^ a pharmacien of Geneva, recommended as a substitute 

 for the bulky powder of the root, an ethereal extract, an efficient 

 preparation, which though proposed in 1825, was scarcely used in 

 England until about 1851 ; at present it is the only form in which 

 male fern is employed. Peschier already observed a crystallized deposit 

 in his extract. 



Description — The fresh rhizome or caudex is short and massive, 

 2-3 inches in diameter, decumbent, or rising a few inches above the 

 ground, and bearing on its summit a circular tuft of fronds, which in 

 their lower part are thickly beset with brown chaffy scales. Below 

 the growing fronds are the remains of those of previous seasons, which 

 retain in their firm, fleshy bases, vitality and succulence for years 

 after their upper portion has perished. From among these fleshy 

 bases, spring the black, wiry, branching roots.' The rhizome is rather 

 fleshy, and easily cut with a knife, internally of a bright pale yellowish 

 green ; it has very little odour and a sweetish astringent taste. For 

 pharmaceutical use, it should be collected in the late autumn, winter or 

 early spring, divested of the dead portions, split open, dried with a 

 gentle heat, reduced to coarse powder, and at once exhausted with ether. 

 Extract obtained in this way is more efficient than that which has 

 been got from rhizome that has been kept some time. 



Microscopic Structure — On transverse section of the rootstock, 

 the tissue shows rounded, somewhat polyhedral cells with porous 

 walls ; the outer cells are brown and rather smaller, but do not exhibit 



^ P. 547 of the work quoted in the Ap- Also English translation by Dr. Sicoinons, 



pendix. London, 1778. 8°. 



2 Comaz, Les families m4dicales de la * Biblioth^que Universelle, xxx. (1825) 205; 



ville de Neuchdtel, 1864. 20. xxx. (1826) 326. 



* Traitement contre le T6nia ou ver soli- ® For a full account of the growth and 



taire, pratique a, Morat en Suisse, examine structure of that rhizome see Luerssen, 



et 4prouv6 d Paris. Public par ordre du Medicinisch-pharmaceiitische Botanik, i. 



Roi, 1775. 4°, pp. 30. 3 plates, one repre- (1878) 504. 561. 

 senting the plant, its rhizome and leaves. — 



