Pharmacographia Indica (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1891 Excerpt: ... brown, marked by longitudinal ridges, and has a rough and somewhat reticulated surface. Its substance is compact and brittle, the fractured surface having a resinous appearance and dirty white colour. The central portion is generally absent, and appears to have been removed by decay before the root was collected. The taste is bitter, pungent and camphorac'eous; the odour resembles that of fresh violets or orris root. Microscopic structure.--Pliickiger in his pamphlet, "Die Frankfurter Liste," Halle, 1873, p. 25, has shown that the root abounds in inulin, and shows, especially in the bark of the branches of the root, large balsam duots. In both these respects Costus root agrees well with Elecampane and other aromatic roots of the Oonipositae. A microscopic examination shows that the root consists of two parts, viz., a thick cortical layer of close texture, pervaded by a few laticiferous ducts and an inner radiating portion, the parenchyma of which is not so dense. This is also provided with laticiferous ducts, and a very abundant scalariform vascular system, which appears to be loaded with resinous matter. We havo not been able to detect any starch, nor does the iodine tost indicate its presence. Adulteration.--The natives of Cashmere say that this drug is apt to be adulterated with five or six other kinds of roots. A sample of false Costus in the Indian.Museum, under the name of J(ut mitha, examined by Cooke, was found to consist of pieces of a cylindrical root from 1 to 3 inches in length and from to 1 inch in thickness; externally it was nearly smooth, or longitudinally striate with transverse paler scars. It was much lighter and less compact than Costus, friable and farinaceous internally, very much subject to attacks from iusects, with little...