Chondodendron or Chondxodendron ? 
i°ao 
the dose of the solid extract would be from five to. ,ten grains, to be 
repeated every two, three or four hours, or three or four times a day, 
according to circumstances. 
As there seem to be no established data to be taken as a guide in its 
administration, the above, I should think, would be a safe approximation 
to the proper dose. Physicians, of course, can increase or diminish the 
dose as their experience and the indications seem to suggest or demand. 
In this way, after a while, the proper dose may be more accurately 
determined. 
The fluid extract of guarana is most agreeably administered mixed 
with simple syrup or the syrup of orange, in the proportion of from 
fifteen to thirty drops to a dessert-spoonful of the vehicle.— Extracted 
from the American Journal of Pharmacy for November , 1874. 
CHONDODENDRON or CHONDXODENDRON? 
BY DANIEL HANBURY. 
In the Pharmaceutical Journal for Nov. 14, it is remarked that the 
authors of the Pharmacographia prefer to write Chondodendron , and not 
as the derivation of the word would seem to require, Chondxodendron. 
The proposal to insert an r in the second syllable emanated from Mr. 
Miers, who, in his Monograph of the Menispermacece , states that the word 
was originally mis-spelt through an error in the press. 
As this name, which is that of the genys to which the Pareira Brava 
plant has been shown to belong, may come into more frequent use than 
hitherto, it is well that we should' know what reasons may be urged in 
favor of each way of spelling. 
The genus made its first appearance in the work of the Spanish bot¬ 
anists Ruiz and Pavon, entitled Florce Peruvians et Chilensis Prodromus , 
sive novorum genefum plantarum Peruvianarum et Chilensium descriptiones 
et icones , published at Madrid in 1794. Here we find it Chondodendron , 
with the derivation explained thus— “a granorum copia quibus arboris 
truncus et rami obsiti sunt. ' ’ This is in allusion to the Greek word %ovdpo<;, 
signifying a corn, grain, or any small roundish mass; and is appropriate 
to the plant by reason of the little black warty spots that cover the bark, 
chiefly of the younger wood. 
From such an origin, coupled with Sevdpov, a tree, the word Chondxo¬ 
dendron would naturally result; but for some reason—as, I believe, for 
the sake of euphony—the authors of the genus chose to drop the first r, 
and to write Chondodendron. That this was by no typographical error 
is obvious. The word occurs again and again; and though there are 
enumerated several i( erratas de impression ,” Chondodendron is not among 
them. Four years after the Prodromus , the authors published their *Sy.f- 
tema Vegetabilium Florce Peruvians et Chilensis , in which they still 
retained Chondodendron : in fact, the name has been almost universally 
accepted. 
Thus De Candolle, in his Systerna, published in 1818, as well as in the 
first volume of his Prodromus , which appeared in 1824, wrote Chondoden- 
MlSSOURl BQTAfSiRni. 
George Engelmann Papers 
