65 
Remarks on Sarsaparilla. 
By BertrHoitp Seemann, Ph. D., F.L.S.* 
A PERUSAL of the various treatises on sarsaparilla tends to confirm 
the soundness of a remark made by Sir William Hooker, that those 
plants most useful to mankind are generally the least known botani- 
cally. Even Pereira, with all his industry and research, could give 
in his ‘Elements of Materia Medica and Therapeutics’ (London, 
1850) but an unsatisfactory account of the botanical sources of the 
various sorts of sarsaparilla; and I well remember, that in the 
last conversation which I had with that great pharmacologist, he 
expressed an ardent wish that some competent person might be 
induced to investigate this perplexing subject. Iam not vain enough 
to look upon myself as the “competent person” to whom Pereira 
wished to assign the investigation ; and if the settlement of the ques- 
tion depended upon the opinion of great authorities, I would not have 
ventured to meddle with it; but, as it has solely to be decided by the 
simple elucidation of facts, I have made an honest attempt to cut the 
knot, the untying of which has been so often tried in vain. 
M. de Warszewicz, during his last visit to the Volcano of Chiri- 
qui, in Veraguas, collected specimens of a sarsaparilla, which he 
transmitted to Mr. Daniel Hanbury, who submitted them to me for 
_ determination. After a careful examination, I pronounced them to 
belong to Smilax officinalis of Humboldt and Bonpland; but, as 
Smilax officinalis, H. et B., had been described from imperfect mate- 
rials, Mr. D. Hanbury made, during a sojourn in Paris, a tracing of 
the original specimens from which the two botanists drew up their 
description. This tracing agreed in every essential point with the 
specimens from the Volcano of Chiriqui, and left in my mind no 
doubt that I had named them correctly. A fortunate coincidence 
confirmed this view. When M. de Warszewicz lately visited Bajor- 
que, in New Granada, the place where Humboldt and Bonpland 
obtained their Smilax officinalis, he took the precaution to collect 
specimens of the sarsaparilla of that locality (where, by the bye, it 
has now become very scarce), which, in November, 1853, he placed 
in the hands of Mr. D. Hanbury, through whose kindness I was able 
to identify them, not only with Smilax officinalis of Humboldt and 
Bonpland, but also with the specimens collected on the Volcano of 
* Read before the Linnean Svciety, December 6, 1853. 
VOL. V. K 
