BAPTISIA TINCTOKIA. 
213 
dant in Michigan,* * * § and most otlier parts of the States of North America, grow¬ 
ing in open saudy woods and dry barren uplands.f It flowers from July to the 
end of August or beginning of September. This and other species are described 
by Loudonf as “ herbaceous plants of easy cultivation, and as border flowers 
ornamental.” 
Collection , etc .—The leaves, rhizomes, aerial stems, and roots, have been all em¬ 
ployed as remedial agents as well as for other purposes. The part commonly 
used is the rhizome and rootlets, under the general, although improper name of 
root, and the bark is said to be the most active portion.§ From experiments made 
by ourselves, we should also regard the cortical portion as being to some extent 
the most powerful part of the plant, but we do not think the difference between 
it and the woody parts is very marked. When the leaves and the aerial stems are 
used, they should be collected about July, just as the flowers are expanding, at 
which time they are in full activity. The rhizome and roots, the parts ordinarily 
employed, and certainly the chief seat of the virtues of the plant, should be col¬ 
lected in the autumn months; or early in the spring, before active vegetation 
has commenced. 
General Characteristics. —The part of Baptism tinctoria, as just noticed, 
which is commonly and properly employed as a remedial agent, is generally 
designated as the root, but the different commercial specimens as seen and exa¬ 
mined by us, consist of roots, rhizomes, and stems, mixed in varying proportions. 
In length the pieces vary commonly from about one inch to four inches, 
averaging about three inches; but shorter and longer pieces may also frequently 
be found. In thickness they vary from about a quarter of an iucli to one 
inch, a common size being about half an inch. In some samples many smaller 
pieces and rootlets may be found, either intermixed with the larger ones, or at¬ 
tached to the rhizomes. Some of the pieces present a very irregular twisted and 
branched appearance, and have numerous projections of varying length ; others 
are nearly straight. Externally they are marked by irregular longitudinal fur¬ 
rows and striae. They vary in colour externally according to their size, being 
yellowish, yellowish-brown, dark-brown, or blackish; more generally they have 
a dark-brown colour. The fracture varies somewhat in different pieces, being in 
some much closer than in others, but it is always more or less irregular and 
fibrous; particularly in the cortical portion. The pieces are very tough, and 
difficult to reduce to powder. 
A transverse section of an average-sized piece shows a compact central woody 
mass or meditullium of a light-yellowish colour, surrounded by a thick brown 
cortical portion, the inner layers of which are tough and fibrous, and the outer 
somewhat of a corky character. This corky appearance is more evident in the 
large pieces. 
Wood and Bache|| describe the root as inodorous, but the specimens as exa¬ 
mined by us, which have been kept in stoppered bottles, have a well-marked 
and peculiar odour. The taste is disagreeably bitter and somewhat acrid; that 
of the cortical portion is most evident, but that of the meditullium is also very 
evident. 
Composition and Chemical Characteristics. —The only analysis of this 
substance with which I am acquainted, and this an incomplete one, is con¬ 
tained in an Inaugural Essay at the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, by Ben¬ 
nett L. Smedley.^f He found albumen, starch, resin, and a crystalline principle, 
* Stearns, in Proc. Amer. Phartn. Assoc, for 1858, p. 247. 
f Wood and Bache’s ‘United States Dispensatory,’ 11th edit. p. 1371. 
% Loudon’s ‘ Encyclopaedia of Plants,’ p. 342. 
§ Wood and Bache’s ‘United States Dispensatory,’ 11th edit. p. 1374. 
|| ‘ United States Dispensatory,’ 11th edit. p. 1374. 
*[ ‘American Journal of Pharmacy,’ vol. x. 3rd ser. p. 310. 
