Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  \ 
March,  1895.  J 
Structure  of  Cimicifuga. 
123 
The  drug  in  the  dried  form  has  a  slight  but  heavy  odor,  and  a 
bitter  and  acrid  taste. 
The  cross-section  of  the  rhizome  or  of  its  branches,  when  stained 
by  aid  of  phloroglucin  and  hydrochloric  acid  to  reveal  distinctly  the 
wood  ivedges,  shows  that  the  latter  are  rather  short,  irregular  in 
size  and  placed  at  unequal  distances  apart  around  a  large  central 
Fig.  3. 
pith.  The  vasal  bundles'  are  usually  considerably  narrower  than 
the  medullary  rays  which  separate  them,  and  the  bark  is  rather 
thick.    These  facts  are  shown  in  Fig.  i. 
A  longitudinal  section  stained  in  the  same  way  shows  the  bundles 
to  be  also  irregular  in  their  course,  and  that  adjacent  bundles  fre- 
quently send  out  anastomosing  branches,  as  indicated  in  Fig.  2. 
