Georgia Bark.

Georgia Bark.—In an article of the New York Times referred to elsewhere (see above (not scanned)) the importance of making systematic experiments for cultivating different species of cinchona in the United States is discussed, and it is stated that there exists a "pseudo-cinchona" tree in Georgia. The tree alluded to is undoubtedly the one called "Georgia bark" in Porcher's Resources of the Southern Fields and Forests. This is the Pinckneya pubens of Michaux, ord. Rubiaceae, subord. Cinchonae which is found on riverbanks and in swampy locations from South Carolina southward to Florida. Under cultivation it usually branches from the base, but in its native localities it is a beautiful tree 20 feet or more in height, with large opposite ovate and acute leaves and with downy cymes of purple-colored flowers, which are radiant by the expansion of a calyx segment of the marginal flowers.

Michaux reported the bark to be useful in intermittent fever, and more recently, Dr. Law, of Georgia, and Dr. Fauntleroi, of Virginia, corroborated this statement. The latter considers it too slow in its action to be used as a substitute for quinia, but as deserving a position in the front ranks of vegetable tonics; it usually produces diaphoresis. The bark is given in the form of powder or of decoction in the dose of about one drachm. Dr. Farr is said to have detected a considerable amount of cinchonia in it, which statement is, probably, not correct, though the substance obtained may have been an alkaloid. It will be remembered that many plants of this order owe their properties chiefly to alkaloids. J. M. M.

The American Journal of Pharmacy, Vol. 53, 1881, was edited by John M. Maisch.