52 ON THE MODE OF PRESERVING COLCHICUM CORMI. 
ART. XIV.— ON THE MODE OF PRESERVING COLCHICUM 
CORMI. 
BY JOSEPH HOULTON, M. D. 
In the last July number of your valuable journal, you 
honored me by a notice of a paper of mine, on the drying 
of roots, &c., which had been read before the Royal Medico- 
Botanical Society; I therefore take the liberty to offer some 
further remarks on the subject — remarks which have been 
stated to the above-named society, but I am not aware that 
they have been made public. It always affords me much 
pleasure to contribute the humble results of my observation 
and experience towards the advancement of a department 
of science that has been till lately too much neglected ; I 
am happy to see a spirit rising amongst the pharmaceutical 
chemists of our country for the improvement of pharmacy. 
England bids fair to be soon foremost in the field of this 
department, from the talent and industry that is now en- 
gaged in the work. It is curious to contemplate the posi- 
tion that pharmaceutical power is likely to hold in a few 
years' time, and also its influence, not only on science, but 
on institutions. 
The observations which I beg to place before you are 
upon the method in which the cormi of colchicum should 
be managed, so as to insure their drying spontaneously 
without being sliced. It is simply this: they are to be 
stripped of their loose dry coats, and the bud or little bulb, 
the rudiment of the future plant, is to be carefully picked 
out — it is a very small part, but easily seen; this part lias 
a high vital endowment, and is very tenacious of life, and 
unless removed the cormi will not readily become dry ; yet 
when that is removed, in any dry place, they will become 
exsiccated without any trouble, and that in a short time. 
To show the difference that this circumstance makes, let a 
