frame lest severe frosts should destroy such as are 
fully exposed. 
Its medicinal (jualities have not, we believe, been 
examined; it belongs, however, to a natural order 
containing plants which are generally acrid and 
bitter, and some which are powerful, as Digitalis 
and Gratiola. We observed that much of the 
herbalists’ knowledge of the medicinal properties 
of plants was transmitted from the ancients; it 
must not, however, be forgotten that to the present 
age, chiefly belongs the discovery of the exceed- 
ingly active properties which exist in the vegetable 
world. The analysis of vegetables and the con- 
centration of their active properties has been most 
successfully pursued by our continental neighbours, 
the Fi ench and Germans. The first of these concen- 
trated alkaline vegetable products, which obtained 
attention, was Morphia — the active ingredient of 
Opium. Quinina and Cinchonia are obtained from 
different varieties of Peruvian bark. The sulphate 
of Quinina is manufactured most extensively in 
Paris on account of the low price at which it can be 
produced, by reason of the cheapness of alchol, which 
is used in its preparation. It is said that 120,000 
ounces are produced there annually. This alone 
shews the importance of vegetables in the Matera 
Medica. From Veratrium album or white helle- 
bore, and our common meadow Saffron, Veratria is 
produced. Digitalina, from Digitalis; Violina from 
the Viola odorata. These preparations, and many 
others, produce the most powerful effects on the 
human frame, even in doses less than a single 
grain. 
Don’s Syst. Bot. 4, 533. 
