Volume 2

Useful knowledge: or a familiar account of the various productions of nature, mineral, vegetable, and animal, which are chiefly employed for the use of man. Illustrated with numerous figures, and intended as a work both of instruction and reference / By William Bingley.

  • Bingley, William, 1774-1823.
Date:
1821
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Useful knowledge: or a familiar account of the various productions of nature, mineral, vegetable, and animal, which are chiefly employed for the use of man. Illustrated with numerous figures, and intended as a work both of instruction and reference / By William Bingley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    159/322 (page 135)
    QUASSIA.-—GAMBOGE. common footstalk is edged on each side with a lecfy membrane. The flowers are bright red, and terminate the brunches in long clusters. This drug was first brought into use in Surinam, by a negro whose name was Quassia, and who employed it with great success in the cure of intermittent and other malignant fevers, which prevail in that flat and marshy country. The offer of a valuable consideration induced him to reveal the secret to Daniel Rolander, a Svyede, who carried specimens of the wood, together with a branch of the tree, the flower, and fruit, to Stockholm, in 1756. Since this period the drug has been generally em- ployed in Europe; and its efficacy in the removal of many diseases has been perfectly ascertained. Dr. Cullen, however, observes, that though it is an excel- lent bitter, and that it will do all that any pure or simple bitter can dp, yet his experience of it had not led him to think it would do more. Quassia is said to possess antiseptic properties, and consequently to have considerable influence in retarding a tendency to putre- faction. It is also sometimes used instead of hops in the brewing of malt liquor. The root, wood, and bark of the quassia tree are all occasionally employed in medicine, and the bark is said to be more intensely bitter than either of the other two. CLASS XL— DODECANDRIA. MONOGYNIA. 145. GAMBOGE is a yellow resinous glim obtained from a, tree (Garcinia cambogia) which grows in several parts of Cambnga or Uamboya in the empire of Tunlcin. The leaves of this tree are oval, but acute. The /lowers have each five petals, and fifteen stamens: they are solitary, terminate