ON  SOUTHERN  PRICKLY  ASH  BARK. 
135 
quently  applied  in  January  of  this  year,  was  enabled  to  obtain, 
at  Beaufort,  S.  C,  branches  of  the  prickly  ash,  and  transmit 
them  to  Philadelphia,  at  which  place  they  arrived  a  short  time 
after  Dr.  Thomas'  decease.  On  the  specimens  coming,  with  the 
private  cabinet  of  their  late  Professor,  into  the  possession  of 
the  College  of  Pharmacy  of  Philadelphia,  the  Board  of  Trus- 
tees of  that  institution  requested  Professor  Bridges  to  take 
charge  of  the  specimens,  and  transmit  an  answer  to  question 
eleven  of  1862,  to  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association 
at  their  next  meeting  in  September. 
The  specimens  were  collected  by  Mr.  W.  Heyser,  a  graduate 
of  the  School  of  Pharmacy,  who,  in  an  accompanying  note, 
says,  11  Ar alia  spinosa,  or  a  plant  I  shall  call  that,  is  very  abun  - 
dant on  the  Sea  Islands.  Zanthoxylum  Carolinianum,  called  by 
the  negroes  '  toothache  bush,'  is  also  abundant.  This  is,  I 
think,  Z.  triearpum  of  Elliot's  old  botany/' 
That  Mr.  Heyser  has  correctly  assigned  the  "  Southern 
Prickly  Ash"  to  its  true  botanical  source,  if  this  name  be  con- 
fined to  the  product  from  the  continent,  and  not  extended  to 
that  from  the  West  India  Islands,  will  be  evident  from  the  fol- 
lowing observations: — Professor  Asa  Gray,  the  standard  au- 
thority for  North  American  botany,  in  the  "  Flora  of  North 
America,"  separates  the  Northern  and  Southern  species  of 
Zanthoxylum  into  two  subgenera,  the  latter  distinguished  by 
the  name  Ochroxylum,  and  the  species  Carolinianum,  this  be- 
ing the  name  first  applied  to  the  plant.  Lam.  Die.  1786,  ii.  p. 
40.  As  synonymes  he  gives  triearpum,  Mich.  Pursh.  Elliot, 
fraxinifolium,  Walter.  In  "The  Natural  History  of  Carolina, 
Florida  and  the  Bahama  Islands,  by  Mark,  Catesby,  F.K.S.,"  is 
a  very  graphic  description  of  the  "Zanthoxylum  Spinosum," 
&c,  at  p.  26.  "  The  Pelitory  or  Toothache  Tree.  This  tree, 
seldom  grows  above  a  foot  in  thickness,  and  about  16  feet  high. 
The  bark  is  white  and  very  rough.  The  trunk  and  large 
limbs  are,  in  a  singular  manner,  thick  set,  with  pyramidal  - 
shaped  protuberances  pointing  from  the  tree  ;  at  the  end  of 
every  one  of  these  there  is  a  sharp  thorn.  These  protuberances 
are  of  the  same  consistence  with'  the  bark  of  the  tree,  of  vari- 
