432 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIII. No. 1108 



the vagus belongs to the sympathetic in the 

 broader sense. 



The figures used in the book are largely new 

 and in all eases well adapted to illustrate the 

 descriptions in the text. P. Gr. Stiles 



SPECIAL ARTICLES 



THE BOTANICAL IDENTITY OF LIGNUM 

 NEPHRITICUM 



The attention of the writer has just been 

 called to the following criticism of his recent 

 preliminary paper on lignum nephriticum, 

 which appeared in Nature^ Vol. 96, page 93, 

 1915. 



The most recent contribution to the history of 

 lignum nephriticum is published in the Journal of 

 the Washington Academy of Sciences (Vol. V., 

 No. 14, August 19, 1915) by Mr. W. E. SafEord. 

 He. gives the name Eysenhardtia polystachya (Or- 

 tega) Sargent, to the tree, and states that its bo- 

 tanical identity has remained uncertain until the 

 present time. This statement, however, is scarcely 

 correct, since the tree "was referred to the genus 

 Viiorquia by Ortega, a name superseded by the 

 later name of Eysenliardtia of Humboldt, Bon- 

 pland and Kunth. These authors correctly named 

 the plant E. amorplioides in 1823, and Mr. Safford, 

 following Sargent, merely restores Ortega's old 

 specific name, Viborquia polystachya, mating 

 Eysenhardtia amorplioides a synonym of E. poly- 

 stachya. 



The above criticism is quite misleading. It 

 is true that the species in question was de- 

 scribed by Ortega in 1798; but Ortega drew 

 his description from a shrub growing in the 

 Eoyal Botanical Garden of Madrid, which had 

 been propagated from seed sent to the garden 

 from Mexico. He had no idea that the plant 

 he described had any connection with the 

 classic lignum nephriticum; he did not know 

 its Mexican name; indeed he was unaware 

 that it might attain the dimensions of a tree. 

 Humboldt, Bonpland and Kunth were like- 

 wise unaware that the plant described by 

 Kunth as Eysenhardtia amorplioides was the 

 source of lignum nephriticum, or that its 

 wood would yield a fluorescent infusion. That 

 its identity with the latter was unknown is 

 shown by the definite statement of Sargent, 

 when establishing the combination Eysen- 



hardtia polystachya. Referring to Eysen- 

 hardtia he says: 



The wood of some species is hard and close- 

 grained and affords valuable fuel. The genus is 

 not known to possess other useful properties.! 



If the species described first by Ortega as 

 Viborquia polystachya and later by Kunth as 

 Eysenhardtia amorphoides was known to be 

 the source of lignum nephriticum, a classic 

 wood remarkable for the fluorescence of its in- 

 fusion and at one time famous throughout 

 Europe, why would not these authors have 

 called attention to its identity? 



The first to indicate its botanical identity, 

 as the writer pointed out in his paper cited 

 above, was Dr. Leonardo Oliva, professor of 

 pharmacology in the University of Guadala- 

 jara (1854), but his identification was not ac- 

 cepted by subsequent authorities. Oliver and 

 Hanbury, in the " Admiralty Manual of 

 Scientific Inquiry " (page 391, 1871), call at- 

 tention to the wood as follows: 



Lignum nephriticum. — This rare wood, noticed 

 by some of the earliest explorers of America, is a 

 production of Mexico. To what tree is it to be 

 referred? Its infusion is remarkable for having 

 the blue tint seen in a solution of quinine. 



In the third edition of the " ISTueva Farma- 

 copea Mexicana" (page 153, 1896) the state- 

 ment is made that leno nefritico had been 

 erroneously attributed to Varennea poly- 

 stachya, or Eysenhardtia amorphoides H. B. 

 K., but that its classification was not known. 

 Dragendorf in his well-known Heilpflanzen 

 (page 345, 1898) refers it to the genus Gua- 

 jacum : 



Das Lignum nephriticum der alteren Medicin 

 wird wohl von einer Guajacum-Art stammen. 



Dr. Otto Stapf, to whose historical paper on 

 lignum nephriticum published in the " Kew 

 Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information'' 

 (pages 293-305, 1909) the writer has already 

 referred, experimented with a piece of wood 

 from the Mexican collection in the Paris Ex- 

 position, bearing the label " Cuatl." Dr. 

 Stapf referred this wood to Eysenhardtia 



1 Sargent, C. S., ' ' The Silva of North America, ' ' 

 Vol. 3, p. 30, 1892. 



