THE  AMERICAN 
JOURNAL  OF  PHARMACY 
APRIL,  1897. 
PARTHENIUM  HYSTEROPHOROUS. 
By  H.  V.  Arny,  Ph.G.,  Ph.D. 
The  Pharmaceutical  Journal  and  Transactions,  in  its  issue  of  May 
30,  1885,  called  the  attention  of  the  pharmaceutical  world  to  this 
"  common  weed  of  Jamaica,"  quoting  from  La  Cronica  Medico-Qui- 
rurgica,  of  Havana,  the  physiological  experiments  of  Dr.  Jose  R. 
Tovar  with  a  so-called  alkaloid,  which  he  named  parthenine,  ob- 
tained from  the  plant.  Another  reference  to  the  body  parthenine 
is  found  in  Pharmaceutical  Journal,  June  26,  1886,  where  the  inves- 
tigations of  M.  Guyet,  as  reported  to  the  Sociefe  de  Therapeulique  of 
Paris,  are  set  forth.  The  next  reference  to  the  plant  is  found  in 
Merck's  Bulletin,  October,  1888,  where  an  alkaloid,  discovered  in 
the  plant  by  Dr.  Carlos  Ulrici,  and  called  parthenicine,  is  described. 
At  this  point  the  writer  undertook  an  investigation  of  the  plant 
as  a  graduation  thesis,  and  as  reported  in  Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  (1890, 
p.  121)  no  evidences  of  an  alkaloid  were  found.  The  alcoholic  ex- 
tract, however,  yielded  a  body  which  was  supposed  to  be  a  glucoside. 
Believing  that  the  plant,  one  of  the  most  common  weeds  of 
Louisiana,  may  have  a  future,  and'  realizing  that  its  active  princi- 
ple might  prove  interesting  chemically,  investigations  were  resumed 
with  general  results  herein  stated. 
BOTANICAL  CHARACTERISTICS. 
Parthenium  hysterophorous  is  a  composite  plant,  sub-order 
Tubulifera,  with  radiate  heads,  pistillate  rays  and  sterile  disc  florets. 
It  is  a  pubescent  annual,  having  diffuse  stem,  pinnatifid  leaves,  with 
linear  toothed  lobes  and  prominent  nervature  {Frontispiece). 
(169) 
