November 18,1871.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
405 
on other kinds. The preparation of the so-called quinium 
from Java harks of a fine quality promises to yield, for 
medical purposes, a substitute for the costly quinine. 
Therapeutical experiments made with this preparation 
during the previous year have given very encouraging- 
results ; and, although the experiments made in the 
State Laboratory at Wetteren to prepare quinium 
with profit cannot he looked upon as successful, they 
have succeeded elsewhere, and will he continued on a 
larger scale. Attention has often been drawn to the 
estimation steadily gaining ground for the alkaloids 
allied to quinine. The results of the experiments made 
in British India have been made public by the British 
Government. These results bear out the conviction 
that, as soon as an opportunity presents itself for the 
preparation of alkaloids in Java, the costly demands for 
quinine from Europe will speedily be brought to a mini¬ 
mum, for the J ava barks, when fresh and gathered from 
healthy trees, contain abundance of alkaloids. A sup¬ 
plement to the report gives a sketch of the experiments 
made in British India.* 
BOTANICAL DESCRIPTION OF CUNDURANGO. f 
The cundurang-o or condor vine, a name derived from 
the two Quichua words cundur and ango, is a climbing 
vine resembling much in its habits the grape-vine of 
our own forests. Springing from the seed generally at 
an altitude of from 4000 to 5000 feet, and on the western 
exposure of the Andes, after growing to the height of 
three or more feet, a slim little stalk, it reaches out and 
finds some strong arm to lean upon; it prefers the tallest 
trees and clings closely to their trunks, winding firmly 
around them, following the growth to the extremity of 
their limbs ; and sometimes, for want of other support, 
returning upon itself, weaving a curious rope of cundu¬ 
rango strands. The natives insist that there are two 
varieties of the vine, the amarillo or yellow, and the 
bianco or white; but careful observation failed to reveal 
any difference between the two, except in the colour of 
the wood ; the leaves, flowers, fruit and seeds are exactly 
the same. To the critical observer the wood of one ap¬ 
pears of a somewhat deeper yellow colour than the other; 
which I attribute to the more direct influence of the 
powerful rays of the sun, the bianco growing more in 
the shade. Both possess equal medicinal properties. 
Cundurango vines of five inches in diameter have been 
found, but generally they are from one to three inches 
in diameter. They are quite flexible -when fresh, but 
when dry very brittle ; the bark, which is the part con¬ 
taining most of the medicinal properties, is, externally, 
of a greenish-grey colour, and has numerous small warty 
excrescences. When freshly cut, it gives an abundant 
milky viscous juice or sap; it is somewhat fibrous, and 
the cut portion of the dry bark presents small yellowish 
dots, easily distinguishable. The odour is balsamic, the 
flavour peculiar and decidedly an aromatic bitter. The 
leaves are large, sometimes reaching six inches in length 
by five in breadth, opposite, simple, entire, cuspidate, 
cordate, and of a dark green colour. The flowers are 
small, arranged in umbels complete, of valvate praeflora- 
tion, five low stamens, sepals five, petals five, filaments 
small, the pollen collected into granular masses, the 
ovary double, the fruit—a pair of dehiscent pods—folli¬ 
cles, five inches in length, flattened on their inner sides 
and joined at the stem and vertex. The seeds are nu¬ 
merous, dark brown and flattened, each with a long 
coma attached to one end. The vine, in many particu¬ 
lars, evinces its relationship to the Aselepiadacese family 
•—approaching the genus Periploca , or, according to the 
classification of Linnaeus, the Pentandria Digynia. 
* See Piiarm. Journ. 3rd Series, Vol. I. p. 325. 
f Extract from the Official Report of Dr. P. T. Keene to 
the U. S. Department of Agriculture ; from N. Y. Drugg. Circ. 
These vines are found at the same altitude and on the 
same exposure of the mountains in nearly all the pro¬ 
vince of Loja, but those containing the most powerful 
medicinal qualities are probably most abundant in the 
mountains of the cantons of Loja, Calvas and Paltas, 
extending south towards the line between Ecuador and 
Peru. Judging from my own observation and the state¬ 
ments of the natives of that region, I believe the true 
cundurango, or that which I have described and which 
has given the wonderful effects upon cancer already 
known to the world, is not abundant. There are very 
many, some fifty or more, varieties of bejucos or climb¬ 
ing vines in Ecuador, several of which give a milky sap, 
and some may and probably do have medicinal proper¬ 
ties more or less potent; several are known to be poi¬ 
sonous. The great difficulty of obtaining the bark of 
the genuine vine and transporting it over the mountains 
to the coast, and the high price which its medicinal pro¬ 
perties will command, may operate to induce the export 
of the bark of many of these other vines which may be 
not only comparatively inert, but many of them posi¬ 
tively injurious, an event much to be feared, and which, 
for the protection of the people whose necessities require 
them to use the medicine, should be scrupulously guarded 
against. The authorities of Ecuador will no doubt soon 
take the proper steps to prevent the exportation of any 
but the bark of the genuine vine. Of the value of the 
cundurango as a remedial agent, I fully assured myself 
while in the interior of the country, both by personal 
observation in some twenty cases of chronic diseases of 
the blood, and from natives who had used it, particularly 
from Senor Don Manuel Eguiguren, Governor of the 
Province of Loja, a man universally beloved and re¬ 
spected by all who know him, and whose kindness and 
invaluable assistance have placed me under lasting 
obligations to him. The cases of cure of chronic ulcers 
by the administration of cundurango which have come 
under his immediate attention, and which he testifies to 
and speaks of with such genuine enthusiasm, are truly 
marvellous, and entirely set at rest any doubts I may 
have entertained, and coupled with evidence presented 
from Quito, from Guayaquil, and all through the inte¬ 
rior, establish beyond a question the value and efficacy 
of this newly-discovered remedy as an alterative and 
purifier of the blood. To the President, Garcia Morena, 
to our excellent Minister, Hon. Rumsey Wing, and to 
Senor Governor Eguiguren the world is indebted, for 
the most part, for this great boon—a knowledge of the 
existence and powers of cundurango; and to them 
Ecuador owes another jewel in her crown, whose placo 
shall be next to that priceless one set there by the dis¬ 
coverer of cinchona bark .—New York Druggists' Circular. 
THE PREPARATION AND PROPERTIES OF THE 
VARIOUS KINDS OF CHINESE TEAS.* 
BY F. rOBTER SMITH, M.B. BOND. 
(Concluded from page 388.) 
It will be remembered that the leaf used in the mak¬ 
ing of Congou tea (black) is first dried in the sun, and 
then compressed, so as to part with any superfluous 
moisture. This must lead to a concentration of the 
principles contained in the leaf. The tea-leaf is stored 
in bags, and generally subjected to a preliminary “ firing” 
in addition to the formal “ firing” previously described, 
in view of any delay which may occur during the collec¬ 
tion of such large quantities as are necessarily prepared 
at one time for the foreign market. Certain chemical 
changes tending to the oxidation of the chemical consti¬ 
tuents of the natural leaf must take place in the repeated 
exposure to a moderate heat, and during the storing 
together in loose heaps of the half-dried leaf freely 
* From the JHedical Times and Gazette. 
