Coca Erythroxylon (Vin Mariani) : its uses in the treatment of disease : with notes and comments by prominent physicians.

  • Mariani & Company.
Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Coca Erythroxylon (Vin Mariani) : its uses in the treatment of disease : with notes and comments by prominent physicians. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    ERYTHROXYLON COCA. ITS USES IN THE TREATMENT OF DISEASE. HISTORY. From the earliest times Coca has been in use in South America. The various authors of books on travel and on European con- quests^ such as Oviedo, Pedro Cie9a de Leon, Zarate, Lopez de Gomara, and others, describe, in glowing colors, the great es- teem in which it has always been held by the natives. It is difficult to judge of the feelings of the men who arrived in an unknown land, dazzled at the sight of a profusion of gold, scattered in palaces, in temples, and even in the most simple dwellings, whose eyes shone with covetousness on seeing so many riches, which they came from so far to take away, and for the conquest of which they would commit the most atrocious acts—acts unworthy not only of Christians, but even of barbari- ans—when they saw that the gold for which they had such savage avidity was almost disdained by the natives, who, instead attached a priceless value to a poor, little, insignificant-looking leaf. What could be the marvellous properties of this leaf, which circulated in place of money among the poorer people, and which truly was in some way a sacred leaf, since it figured