Pharmacographia. By Friedrich A. Flfickiger and Daniel Hanbury. (Macmillan.)—This is
an exhaustive book on its subject, the "History of the Principal Drugs of Vegetable Origin mot with in Great Britain and British India." The botanical description, the history—which in- cludes what is known about the first and subsequent use of the drug—the description of the appearance. texture, &c., of the article as it is met with in commerce, its microscopical structure, and its chemical com- position, sition are the heads of each article. A brief note—the volume does not aim at any therapeutical purpose—indicates the medicinal use of tho drug, and in many cases it has been found necessary, we are sorry to say, to add an account of the prevalent adulterations. An outsider is struck with the amazing number of the remedies which the sagacity or credulity of mankind has accepted for its various ailments. The index extends to nineteen pages, each page being divided into three columns, and each column containing, at least, fifty names. Many of these are, of course, varieties of the same. There are twelve kinds of Aconite, fourteed of Aloe, and twenty- one of Gum. The arrangement of the book is botanical. There are two great divisions,—Phaenogamous, or flowering-plants, subdivided into Dicotyledons and Monocotyledons; and Cryptogamous, or flowerless- plants, subdivided into Acrogens and Thallogens. Under each sub- division comes its various orders, ranunculacece heading the list. Ap- propriately enough, this order gives us, as the first drug to be described, the classical hellebore. Unfortunately, the hellebore of the ancients appears not to be the same with the modern drug, and as for its use, it is humiliating to find that it is degraded from its lofty function of ministering to a mind diseased to the base reputation of being "a drastic purgative." In British medicine its employment is neatly obsolete, but the drug is still imported from Germany, and sold for the use of domestic animals." It will be seen that the lay reader may pick up something from this volume. For the student and professional man, it is a book of reference of the highest value.
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