1832.] Account of the Botanic Garden at Sehardnpur. 53 



praised in their works ; but as most of the articles are of European 

 growth, the distance which they have to travel is great, and the adul- 

 terations proportionally numerous : the natives, both physicians and 

 patients, being too ignorant of the original article to be able to detect 

 the falsification. As considerable anxiety however is now displayed, 

 and expence incurred by the Government in the instruction of native 

 doctors for the public service, the benefit of which must eventually 

 extend to the class of practitioners who administer to the mass of the 

 population, it would appear the part of a wise and provident fore- 

 sight, that as a more correct knowledge of medicine is imparted, and 

 the art of detecting the impostures in drugs is acquired, means should 

 be adopted of more genuine articles being provided. This might be 

 effected by first investigating the true value of genuine Indian medicines, 

 and then naturalizing in the hills or plains such articles as they are 

 deficient in, or which are now of foreign growth. 



That the success would be considerable, I feel warranted in as- 

 suming, from the results of the experiments I have already made, even in 

 introducing medicines for the use of the public service, which have 

 borne the test of comparative trials with the best from European depots. 

 The difficulties to be surmounted may not be so obvious, except to 

 those who have made similar attempts; but if it be conside ed that 

 not only the seed or plant is first to be procured, then grown with all the 

 care of an exotic, extended into a crop, and converted into a form fit for 

 exhibition as a medicine, then proved equal in medical virtue and at 

 the same time cheaper than those already in use, ths attempt will not 

 appear so easy ; particularly if it be remembered, that not an oil can 

 be distilled, without first making a still, nor an extract prepared with- 

 out first constructing an apparatus for expressing the juice, and then 

 evaporating it to a proper consistence in an apparatus of steam. 



Among the articles which have been introduced and reported upon 

 by Mr. Twining*, after experiments made at the General Hospital, it 

 appears, that " the cultivation of rhubarb at the Masuri Tabba, 

 is expected to afford a very valuable remedy, which is less disagreeable 

 to take than the best Turkey rhubarb, nearly equally efficacious as 

 a purge, and very superior in small doses as a tonic and astringent in 

 profiuvia ;" and Mr. Twining concludes his report with saying, that" the 

 acquisition of this remedy to the materia medica of this country will be 

 of the utmost importance." The medicine has been introduced, and 



* Mr. Turning's experiments, on the Rliubarb of the Hills, mid the Senna and 

 Henbane grown at Seharanpur, are published in the 4th and 5th volumes of the 

 Transactions of the Medical Society of Calcutta. 



