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Selected Articles. 
The pharmaceutic preparations of this plant are tincture, 
wine, extract, ointment, infusion, decoction and powder of the 
root. Of these, the tincture, wine, extract and ointment, are 
the most eligible forms, and for common medicinal purposes, 
appear to be all that are requisite. 
The tincture is prepared by adding the recent bruised root, 
^vj. to diluted alcohol, Oj. I was formerly in the habit of 
using gviij. to the pint, but this appears to be more than is 
necessary for saturation: medium dose from f. 3ss. to f. 3j- 
For the wine, recent bruised root, gyj. ; white wine, ^xiv.: 
officinal alcohol, ?ij. The alcohol is necessary to prevent the 
preparation from becoming sour in warm weather ; dose the 
same as of the tincture. In reference to the relative value of 
these two preparations, I do not know that any thing can be 
said in favour of the wine, which would not with equal truth 
apply to the tincture. In medicinal efficacy, there appears to 
be no appreciable difference. The extract is made simply by 
expressing the juice of the recent root, and inspissating in the 
sun. Thus prepared, it is hard and dry, of a grayish colour, 
and capable of being reduced to an impalpable powder. It 
requires a considerable quantity of the root to produce much 
of the extract. To obtain the juice it must be strongly bruis- 
ed and subjected to strong pressure. 
I was first induced to make this preparation for the purpose 
of having a form which would embody the greatest activity 
in the least bulk, and which would retain this activity a longer 
time than the crude root. In these particulars my expecta- 
tions have been fully realized. Its activity is sufficiently at- 
tested in the experiments already detailed. Medium dose from 
one-fourth to one-half grain. I have rarely been able to ex- 
ceed one-half of a grain, when repeated at intervals of three 
or four hours, without producing more or less narcosis and 
disturbance of the stomach. For what length of time this ex- 
tract when excluded from the air will fully retain its medi- 
cinal activity I am unable to say; I now have in my posses- 
sion a part of the first parcel which I prepared, and although 
about three years old, does not appear to have lost any of its 
strength. It has been kept excluded from the air, though not 
