88 
highlands between this place and Schoharie. The Indians 
are said to cure the bite of the Rattlesnake with this root, 
and they were perhaps first induced to use it, by the striking 
resemblance which it bears to the rattles of this dreadful 
animal. There is a great demand for it in medicine, and its 
discovery in our neighbourhood will be important. 
The Delphinium Consolida, or common Larkspur, has been 
found to possess many useful qualities, and it may be used 
in some instances for the Digitalis Purpqria, or Foxglove,* 
a medicine in some cases indispensable; and the effects of 
which notwithstanding, on the vision, are equally distressing 
and wonderful. The imagination of the patient, also, both 
in his sleeping and wakeful hours, is powerfully affected 
by it. 
The headlong precipice that thwarts the flight, 
The trackless desert, the cold starless night. 
And stern-eyed Murder with his knife behind, 
In dread succession agonize the mind. 
To relieve us from these consequences of the Digitalis, we 
have a hope in the Delphinium. A tincture made of the 
bruised seeds has been the mode of its preparation.! 
The Columbo root was discovered in the western part of 
this state last summer, by Mr. Whitlow. Willdenow sup¬ 
poses it to belong to a species of the Bryonia. This how^ 
ever is doubtful. A technical name, it is known, will short¬ 
ly be given to the plant. Its present appellation is from Co¬ 
lumbo, a town in Ceylon from whence all India is supplied., 
It grows also in Africa,! and forms an important article of 
commerce with the Portuguese at Mozambique. Its use 
and importance in medicine is fully established, and it has 
hitherto been the subject of regret, that the irregularity at¬ 
tending its importation, has obliged practitioners often to 
exhibit it in a decayed state, owing to long keeping. 
* See Medical Repos. Hex. Ill, vol. 2. p. 232, for a particular ac¬ 
count of this important plant. 
I See Dr. A. Blanchard’s communication to the New-England Med, 
and Surg. Journal, vol. 2, p. 248. 
t Duncan’s Dispensatory, p. 203. 
