220 
Digitalis.  Foxglove. 
f  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\       May,  1913. 
the  second  year's  growth.  Upon  the  contrary,  he  states  that  at 
different  seasons  of  the  year  the  quality  varies  greatly,  which,  we 
will  remark,  is  true  of  all  herbs.  He  therefore  restricts  the  leaves 
employed  to  those  of  a  prime  quality,  gathered  when  the  plant  is 
in  flower,6  making  no  other  reference  whatever  to  either  the  first 
or  the  second  year's  crop.    We  quote  as  follows : 
"  These 7  I  had  found  to  vary  much  as  to  dose,  at  different  seasons  of 
the  year;  but  I  expected,  if  gathered  always  in  one  condition  of  the  plant, 
viz.,  when  it  was  in  flowering  state,  and  carefully  dried,  that  the  dose  might 
be  ascertained  as  exactly  as  that  of  any  other  medicine ;  nor  have  I  been 
disappointed  in  this  expectation." 
During  the  past  fifteen  years  the  writer  has  cultivated  more  or 
less  Digitalis,  but  has  failed  to  discover  any  advantage  that  the 
second  year's  crop  possesses  over  the  mature  leaf  of  the  first  year, 
other  than  that  there  is  a  greater  number  of  mature  leaf  of  the 
second  year,  the  crop  being  heavier  than  the  first  year.  In  the 
original  European  experimentation  the  seed  and  flowers  were  also 
employed  in  therapy,  but  soon  passed  into  disuse.8  Withering  em- 
ployed the  leaf  texture  (Fig.  5)  after  removing  the  ribs  and  fibers. 
Constituents. 
So  energetic  a  drug  as  Digitalis  became,  naturally,  an  early 
prey  to  the  interstructural  desecrater  and  the  reckless  destroyer  of 
natural  substances.  To  the  many  products  created  and  evolved, 
seemingly  every  conceivable  play  has  been  made  on  the  name  of  the 
drug.  Some  of  these  names  have  been  applied  and  reapplied  to 
materials  so  different  from  each  other  as  to  lead  to  hopeless  con- 
6  The  second  year  is  the  flowering  year. — L. 
7  The  leaves. — L. 
8  When  assayed  by  the  Keller-Fromme  method,  the  radical  leaves  of 
Digitalis  yield  from  0.527  to  0.531  per  cent,  of  digitoxin,  the  flowers  from 
0.563  to  0.585  per  cent.,  and  the  seeds  from  0.215  to  0.225  per  cent.  A. 
Barenstein  (Pharm.  Zeit.,  1910,  56,  128).  Hirohashi  (Jour,  pharm  soc, 
Japan),  on  the  contrary,  concludes  as  follows:  1.  The  small  upper  leaves 
of  the  plant  are  more  active  than  the  large  middle  and  lower  leaves.  2.  The 
leaves  should  be  gathered  before  budding  sets  in.  3.  The  flowers  seem  to 
contain  a  larger  amount  of  the  active  principles  than  the  leaves.  4.  The 
flowers  retain  their  activity  for  a  year,  red  and  white  being  identical. 
5.  The  seeds  are  physiologically  as  active  as  the  leaves  and  flowers.  The 
stems  are  poorer  in  active  principles. — Drugg.  Cir.,  Feb.,  1913. 
