638 DRUGS, NARCOTICS ETC. 



But the cinchona tree once glowing abundantly, quinine would of course 

 become infinitely cheaper. 



Under a proper system of culture, quill bark only need be taken without 

 destroying the trees, and an earlier return be obtained. 



There never yet has been a substitute found for cinchona bark and its salts, 

 as an antiperiodic and tonic. 



It yet remains for some one to find an equally efficacious substitute, and thus 

 make a fortune. In the mean time the importance of the cinchona is paramount. 



The cinchona tree, like the pimento, deteriorates under cultivation, and in moist, 

 warm, rich valleys the bark becomes inert. The best bark is from trees growing 

 on mountain tops or steep declivities. 



Jb'roin the full accounts of Condamine, Mutis, and Humboldt, a soil and climate 

 like that of the north west sub-Himalayan range is admirably adapted to the 

 planting and prospering of cinchona trees. 



In Lord W. Bentinck's time, before there were steamers in or to India, seeing 

 the immense benefit to be derived, I sent in a proposition to procure young 

 cinchona plants from Vera Cruz, begging to be then permitted to proceed there 

 on that account, and my proposition was civilly and even favorably received ; 

 but these were not the days to act on it. 



Of about the twenty species of cinchona trees the following would of course 

 be the best to bring the Cinchona bineifolia, the cinchona cordifolia, the cinchona 

 oblong if olia, the cinchona micrantha, and the cinchona condaminea. 



The CALTJMBA PLANT (Cocculus palmatus, Decandolle, or Me- 

 nispermum palmatum) furnishes the medicinal Colombo root, which 

 is one of the most useful stomachics and tonics in cases of dys- 

 pepsia. It is scarcely ever cultivated, the spontaneous produce 

 of thick forests on the shores of Oibo and Mozambique and 

 many miles inland on the eastern shores of Africa, Mada- 

 gascar and Bombay, proving sufficient. The supplies principally 

 go to Ceylon. The roots are perennial, and consist of several 

 fasciculated, fusiform, branched, fleshy, curved and descending 

 tubers, from one to two inches thick, with a brown warty 

 epidermis ; internally deep yellow, odorless, very bitter. 



The main roots are dug up by the natives in March (the hot 

 season). The offsets are cut in slices and hung up on cords to 

 dry in the shade. It is deemed fit to ship when, on exposure to 

 the sun, it breaks short, and of a bad quality when it is soft 

 and black. (" Pereira's Materia Medica.") 



It contains a bitter crystallizable principle called Calumbin. 



The commercial parcels are often adulterated with the roots 

 of Cost us indicus, C. speciosus, and C. Arabicus (Kusmus, 

 Putckuk, &c.). It is imported into this country in bags and 

 chests of from one to three cwt., and ranges in price from 1 

 to 2 the cwt. The imports in 1846 to London were 82 

 packages, and in 1850, 214 packages, but the stock held in 

 London is always large, being nearly 2,500 packages. 



COLOCYNTH, furnished by Cucumis colocynthis and C. pseudo 

 colocynthis, is the dried medullary part of a wild species of 

 gourd which is cultivated in Spain. It also grows wild in Japan, 

 the sandy lands of Coromandel, Cape of Good Hope, Syria, 

 Nubia, Egypt, Turkey, and the islands of the Grecian Archi- 

 pelago. It may be obtained in the jungles of India in cart 



