VARIETIES. 
77 
that  I  was  absent  from  the  office,  I  am  not  advised,  neither  am  I  at  this 
time  able  to  say  what  has  been  done  under  the  requirements  of  this  act 
at  the  other  ports  of  entry.  I  hope,  however,  that  the  special  examiners 
can  give  a  good  account  of  their  stewardship,  and  that  they  will  not  hesi- 
tate to  do  so,  whenever  the  information  is  desirable  as  a  means  of  pushing 
on  the  column  of  medical  and  pharmaceutical  reform. 
It  will  be  seen  by  the  above  statement,  that  by  far  the  largest  quantity 
of  any  one  article  rejected,  is  that  of  spurious  Peruvian  bark,  or,  as  it  is 
generally  known  in  commerce,  Carthagena  and  Maracaibo  bark :  and  that, 
too,  as  a  general  thing,  of  the  poorest  and  most  worthless  quality.  The 
best  of  this  bark  affords  on  analysis  only  an  exceedingly  small  per  centage 
of  quinine,  not  unfrequently  but  a  mere  trace  ;  while,  at  the  same  time,  it 
yields  as  high  as  two,  and  occasionally,  with  choice  samples,  two  and  a  half 
per  cent,  of  a  peculiar  alkaloid,  which  has  been  named  quinidine,  in  contra- 
distinction to  quinine,  cinchonine,  and  aricine,  (the  three  alkaloids  hereto- 
fore obtained  from  the  different  varieties  of  the  cinchona  tribe  of  plants,) 
from  which  it  differs  essentially  in  several  respects. 
What  is  quinidine  medicinally  understood?  How  does  sulphate  of  quini- 
dine  compare  with  sulphate  of  quinine  (from  which  it  is  very  difficult  to 
distinguish  it  by  the  naked  eye,  medicinally,  as  a  remedial  agent  in  cases 
where  the  use  of  the  latter  salt  is  particularly  indicated  ?  These  are  im- 
portant questions,  and  the  subject  is  one  very  properly  at  the  present  time 
calling  for  prompt,  patient,  and  persevering  investigation  by  all  those  whose 
mission  it  is  to  prepare,  dispense  or  prescribe  the  most  efficient  means 
wherewith  to  combat  disease ;  the  more  so  for  the  reason,  that  I  have  de- 
tected in  most  of  the  sulphate  of  quinine  lately  imported  from  abroad,  more 
or  less  of  this  non-officinal,  and,  (in  my  opinion)  as  compared  with  quinine, 
non-efficient  substance  yclept  quinidine  ;  a  fact  readily  accounted  for,  when 
it  is  known  that  for  the  last  year  or  two  immense  quantities  of  the  bark 
in  question,  good,  bad  and  indifferent,  have  been  exported  from  New  Grenada, 
(as  well  as  much  from  this  port  that  has  been  rejected,)  and  purchased  by 
foreign  manufacturing  chemists,  for  the  purpose,  as  I  have  reason  to  be- 
lieve, of  mixing  it  with  the  true  bark  in  the  manufacture  of  the  sulphate  of 
quinine  ;  hence  the  hybrid  salt  now  too  frequently  presented  to  entry ;  a 
practice  that,  if  not  speedily  abandoned,  will  ruin,  as  far  as  this  country  is 
concerned,  the  formerly  well-deserved  reputation  of  more  than  one  of  the 
foreign  manufactures  of  sulphate  of  quinia  I  could  name.  The  argument 
maintained  by  some  of  them,  that  the  article  is  used  in  their  hospitals  and 
found  equal  to  pure  quinine,  will  not  answer  on  this  side  of  the  water ;  it 
smacks  too  much  of  the  almighty  dollar,  even  as  I  must  believe  (until  fur- 
ther advised)  at  the  expense  of  truth. 
This  comparatively  inert  substance,  quinidine,  is  readily  detected  by 
using  the  method  adopted  by  Zimmer,  and  published  in  the  March  number 
of  the  Pharmaceutical  Journal  (London,)  and,  as  I  was  happy  to  seer  trans- 
