DR. EDWARDS' REPORT. 
163 
A case requiring decision, and involving nice discrimina- 
tion, was recently presented at the New York customs, and 
presuming it has, or may, very shortly be submitted to you, 
I beg leave, in accordance with your request, to offer some 
suggestions upon it. Some fourteen thousand pounds of 
Maracaibo bark was presented for entry, and rejected as 
"unfit for medicine." It is one of the numerous varieties 
of cinchona, but possesses neither quinine nor cinchonine? 
(the distinguishing medicinal qualities of those barks.) It 
was invoiced at $4 per 100 pounds. The genuine Peruvian 
bark is worth $70 per 100 pounds. No one doubted the 
genuineness of this bark, but the question arose " is it fit" 
and " proper to to be used as a medicine," possessing no- 
thing of medicinal virtue, save a slightly astringent property, 
and in that inferior to many species of our oaks, and vastly 
inferior to the Cornus Florida, (dog-wood ;) it has one fatal 
quality, and one on which depends its danger, its colour. 
It so closely resembles the yellow valuable variety of the 
cinchona, that an admixture of fifty per cent, would not be 
detected without analysis, and the adulterations of that 
valuable and indispensable medicine have been almost ex- 
clusively with this article. The owner of this bark admits 
that no physician would prescribe it as a medicine, but 
plead its use for tooth powder. 'Tis true, it would make 
tooth powder, but the assurance it would be turned to that 
account, and that alone, was wanting. It is also alleged 
as being used for tanning, and the examiner has consented, 
when satisfactory evidence of its application to that pur- 
pose alone be presented, to reconsider the exclusion. 
Construing the law literally, yet in its most obvious sig- 
nification, the fitness of the article for medicinal purposes 
governed the decision of the examiner. Most heartily do 
I acquiesce in that decision, and accord to him skill, and 
and an honest fulfilment of the duties of his post ; placed 
there to guard against impositions of the most dangerous 
kind, he has withstood the arguments of the interested with 
