royle's manual of materia medica, etc. 261 
REVIEW. 
ART. LVIII. — A MANUAL OF MATERIA MEDICA AND THERA- 
PEUTICS. INCLUDING THE PREPARATIONS OF THE PHAR- 
MACOPOEIAS OF LONDON, EDINBURG, AND DUBLIN, 
WITH MANY NEW MEDICINES. By J. Forbes Royle, M. D. ; 
F. R. S., k, Prof, of Mat. Med. and Therapeutics, Kings College, 
London, 1847. 
The author of this Manual has for some time been be- 
fore the public as a laborious and thoroughly scientific cul- 
tivator of the department of Materia Medica. His "Essay 
on the Antiquity of Hindoo Medicine," and "Illustrations 
of Himalayan Botany, ;? have given to him a high standing 
on the list of sa vans, and the present treatise, which contains 
much of the lore accumulated while in India, has demon- 
strated how well fitted he has rendered himself to illustrate 
the subject to which it is devoted. From the general exe- 
cution of the work, its completeness with respect to Ma- 
teria Medica proper, although in a condensed form, the 
great amount of new and most interesting matter contained 
in it, and the admirable arrangement; one would suppose 
that no apology were necessary for its appearance; yet the 
author has conceived that some explanation was proper. 
In his preface he states that it was undertaken at the re- 
quest of his intelligent publisher, who may be supposed to 
be well acquainted with the wants of the Profession. This 
alone, however, would not have been sufficient to have in- 
duced the author to undertake the work, had he not also been 
aware, "from the complaint of pupils, and convinced from 
his experience as a teacher, that the student of Materia 
Medica required something systematic to study, which, 
brought up to the present time, should be sufficiently full 
for information, and yet as short and condensed as was 
compatible with the avoidance of being superficial." An- 
