Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
July,  1889. 
The  Genus  Psoralea. 
351 
nervine,  and  is  used  in  chronic  strumous  diarrhoea.  The  same  prop- 
erties were  attributed  to  it  by  Dr.  Mettauer,  in  1867.  It  is  said  to 
have  been  much  and  very  advantageously  employed  by  the  negroes 
in  an  affection  of  the  digestive  organs,  known  to  them  by  the  name 
of  poison,  and  is  usually  given  in  the  form  of  infusion  made  with 
the  addition  of  a  little  chamomile  and  Canadian  hemp  (apocynum). 
Mr.  MacNair  has  made  a  number  of  galenical  preparations,  among 
them 
Tinctura  Psoralece  composita,  following  the  pharmacopoeial  formula 
for  compound  tincture  of  gentian,  substituting  psoralea  root  for  the 
gentian. 
Extractum  Psoralece  was  prepared  with  diluted  alcohol  and  Extr. 
Psoralece  flwidum  with  diluted  alcohol,  the  finished  preparation  con- 
taining 5  per  cent,  of  glycerin. 
Mr.  Bradley  states  that  the  drug  is  administered  in  the  form  of  a 
20  per  cent,  tincture,  made  with  diluted  alcohol,  and  given  in  doses  of 
one  to  four  drachms. 
Some  of  the  popular  names  of  the  drug  are  Samson's  snake  root, 
congo  root,  pigtail  root,  and  Bob's  root. 
Psor'alea  pentaphylla,  Einnt,  is  a  Mexican  species  having  five  leaf- 
lets. Daring  the  past  century  the  root  was  sent  to  Spain ;  it  is  men- 
tioned in  the  universal  pharmacopoeias  of  Jourdan  (1828),  and  Geiger 
(1835),  as  radix,  contrayervce  novw,  p.  albce  (s.  majoris,  s.  mexicance) ; 
it  had  been  recommended  as  a  substitute  for  the  South  American  con- 
trayerva  (Dorstenia),  but  like  the  latter  had  become  obsolete.  Though 
of  Mexican  origin,  it  appears  to  be  at  present  little  known  in  that 
country,  and  is  not  mentioned  in  the  Mexican  Pharmacopoeias  of 
1874  and  1884.  The  root  was  described  as  being  of  the  thickness  of 
a  finger  to  about  two  inches,  with  a  rugose  brown  bark,  which  is  in- 
ternally white  and  covers  a  white  woody  axis ;  taste  aromatic  and 
sweet. 
Recently  the  drug  was  chemically  examined  by  Mariano  Lozano  y 
Castro,1  who  obtained  the  following  results :  Moisture,  1O0 ;  ash, 
3*75;  extracted  by  petroleum  ether  (fat,  1*38  ;  resin  and  volatile  oil, 
0*12),  1*50  ;  ether  extract  (crystalline  acid,  0*40,  fat,  0*50,  resin  and 
color,  2*40),  3*30  ;  alcohol  extract  (alkaloid  and  glucose,  9*25  ;  resin, 
1*46),  10*71 ;  water  extract,  gum  and  sugar,  8*336  ;  starch,  26*5  ; 
albuminoids,  1*0  ;  cellulose  and  lignin,  28*75  per  cent.    The  presence 
1  La  contrayerba  blanca  o  de  Mexico.    Mexico,  1889.  Pp.48. 
