The frail withered stem of the previous year with the cluster of newlysprouted leaves, is cut away from the top of the root, around which a trench of 6 inches wide and as many deep, is dug in the earth. Several deep incisions are now made in the upper part of the root, and this operation is repeated every 3 or 4 days as the sap continues to exude, which goes on for a week or two according to the strength of the plant. The juice collects in tears about the top of the root, or when very abundant flows into the hollow around it. In all cases as soon as incisions are made, the root is covered with a bundle of loose twigs or herbs, or even with a heap of stones, to protect it from the drying effects of the sun. The quantity of gum-resin obtained is variable; some roots yield scarcely half an ounce, others as much as two pounds. Some of the roots are no larger than a carrot, others attain the thickness of a man's leg. The drug is said to be mostly adulterated before it leaves the country, by admixture of powdered gypsum or flour. The finest sort, which is generally sold pure, is obtained solely "from the node or leafbud in the centre of the root-head." At Kandahar, the price of this superior drug is equivalent to from 2s. 8d. to 4s. 8d. per b., while the ordinary sort is worth but from 1s. to 2s.

During a journey from North-western India to Teheran in Persia, through Beluchistan and Afghanistan, performed in the spring of 1872, the same traveller observed the asafoetida plant in great abundance on many of the elevated undulating pasture-covered plains and hills of Afghanistan, and of the Persian province of Khorassan. He states that the plant is of two kinds, the one called Kamá-i-gawi which is grazed by cattle and used as a potherb, and the other known as Kamá-i-angúza which affords the gum-resin of commerce. The collecting of this last is almost exclusively in the hands of the western people of the Kákarr tribe, one of the most numerous and powerful of the Afghan clans, who when thus occupied, spread their camps over the plains of Kandahar to the confines of Herat.1

Wood, in his journey to the source of the Oxus, found asafoetida to be largely produced in a district to the north of this, namely the mountains around Saigan or Sykan (lat. 35° 10, long. 67° 40), where, says he, the land affording the plant is as regularly apportioned out and as carefully guarded as the cornfields on the plain.2

Description-The best asafoetida is that consisting chiefly of agglutinated tears. Freshly imported, it forms a clammy yet hard yellowishgrey mass, in which opaque, white or yellowish milky tears sometimes an inch or two long, are more or less abundant. By exposure to air, it acquires a bright pink and then a brown hue. The perfectly pure tears display when fractured a conchoidal surface, which changes from milky white to purplish pink in the course of some hours. If a tear is touched with nitric acid, sp. gr. 1-2, it assumes for a short time a fine green colour. When asafoetida is rubbed in a mortar with oil of vitriol, then diluted with water and neutralized, the slightly coloured solution exhibits a bluish fluorescence. The tears of asafoetida when warmed become adhesive, but by cold are rendered so brittle that they may be powdered. With water they easily form a white emulsion. The drug has a powerful and persistent alliaceous odour and a bitter acrid alliaceous taste.

1 Bellew, From the Indus to the Tigris, London. 1874. 101. 102. 286. 321. &c.

2 Wood, Journey to the Source of the River Oxus, new ed., 1872. 131.

Sometimes asafoetida has been imported as a fluid honey-like mass, apparently pure. We presume that such is that of the first gathering, which Kämpfer says is called milk. The drug is often adulterated with earthy matter which renders it very ponderous. This earthy or stony asafoetida constitutes at Bombay, a distinct article of commerce under the name of Hingra, the purer drug being called Hing.

Among the natives of Bombay, a third form of asafoetida is in use that commands a much higher price than those just described, and is therefore never brought into European trade. It forms a dark brown, translucent, brittle mass, of extremely fœtid alliaceous odour, containing many pieces of the stem with no admixture of earth. Guibourt by whom it was first noticed 2 was convinced that it had not been obtained from the root, but had been cut from the stem. He remarks that Theophrastus alludes to asafoetida (as he terms the Silphium3 of this author) as being of two kinds, the one of the stem, the other of the root; and thinks the former may be the sort under notice. Vigier who calls it Asa fætida nauséeux, found it to consist in 100 parts, of resin and essential oil 37.50, gum 23-75, remains of stalks 38.75. This drug appears to be the superior sort alluded to by Bellew.

Chemical Composition-Asafoetida consists of resin, gum and essential oil, in varying proportions, but the resin generally amounting to more than one half. Malic acid, so generally diffused in umbelliferous plants, is also present; and the watery distillate contains acetic, formic, and valerianic acids.

The volatile oil amounts to between 3 and 5 per cent. It contains sulphur, and must therefore be distilled from glass vessels. light yellow, has a repulsive, very pungent odour of asafoetida, tastes at first mild, then irritating, but does not stimulate like oil of mustard when applied to the skin. It is neutral, but after exposure to the air acquires an acid reaction and different odour; it evolves sulphuretted hydrogen. In the fresh state, the oil is free from oxygen; it begins to boil at 135° to 140° C., but with continued evolution of hydrogen sulphide, so that even Hlasiwetz did not succeed in preparing it of constant composition, the amount of sulphur varying from 20 to 25 per cent. It appears to be a mixture of sulphur-compounds of the radical CH", the possible relations of which to allyl C3H5 (p. 63) require further investigation. To this however, the insufferable odour of the crude oil is a serious obstacle.

Oil of asafoetida when treated with oxydizing agents, yields besides oxalic acid, acids of the fatty series up to valerianic acid. Potassium decomposes it with evolution of gas, forming potassium sulphide; the residual oil is found to have the odour of cinnamon.

The resin of asafoetida is not wholly soluble in ether or chloroform, but dissolves with decomposition in warm concentrated nitric acid. It contains Ferulaic Acid, C10H1004, discovered by Hlasiwetz and Barth in 1866, crystallizing in iridescent needles soluble in boiling water; it is homologous with Eugetic Acid, CH1204. Fused with potash, ferulaic acid yields oxalic and carbonic acids, fatty acids, and likewise

1 A large specimen of it was kindly presented to one of us (H.) by Mr. D. S. Kemp of Bombay. We have also examined the same drug in the India Museum.

Hist. des Drogues, iii. (1850) 223.

3 Hist. Plantarum, 1. vi. c. 3.

4 Gommes résines des Ombellifères (thèse), Paris, 1869. 32.

protocatechuic acid. The resin itself treated in like manner after it has been previously freed from gum, yields resorcin; and by dry distillation, oils of a green, blue, violet or red tint, besides about per cent. of Umbelliferone, CoH6O3.

Commerce-The drug is at the present day produced exclusively in Afghanistan. Much of it is shipped in the Persian Gulf for Bombay whence it is conveyed to Europe; it is also brought into India by way of Peshawur, and by the Bolan pass in Beluchistan.

In the year 1872-73, there were imported into Bombay1 by sea, chiefly from the Persian Gulf, 3367 cwt. of asafoetida, and 4780 cwt. of the impure form of the drug called Hingra. The value of the latter is scarcely a fifth that of the genuine kind known as Hing. The export of asafoetida from Bombay to Europe is very small in comparison with the shipments to other ports of India.

Uses-Asafoetida is reputed stimulant and antispasmodic. It is in great demand on the Continent, but is little employed in Great Britain. Among the Mahommedan as well as Hindu population of India, it is generally used as a condiment, and is eaten especially with the various pulses known as dál. In regions where the plant grows, the fresh leaves are cooked as an article of diet.

Adulteration-The systematic adulteration chiefly with earthy matter already pointed out, may be easily estimated by exhausting the drug with solvents and incinerating the residue.

GALBANUM.

Gummi-resina Galbanum; Galbanum; F. Galbanum; G. Mutterharz.

Botanical Origin-The uncertainty that exists as to the plants which furnish asafoetida, hangs over those which produce the nearly allied drug Galbanum. Judging from the characters of the latter, it can scarcely be doubted that it is yielded by umbelliferous plants of at least two species, which are probably the following:2.

1. Ferula galbaniflua Boiss. et Buhse, a plant with a tall, solid stem, 4 to 5 feet high, greyish, tomentose leaves, and thin flat fruits, 5 to 6 lines long, 2 to 3 broad, discovered in 1848 at the foot of Demawend in Northern Persia, and on the slopes of the same mountain at 4,000 to 8,000 feet, also on the mountains near Kuschkäk and Churchurä (Jajarúd ?). Bunge collected the same plant at Subzawar. Buhse says that the inhabitants of the district of Demawend collect the gum resin of this plant which is Galbanum; the tears which exude spontaneously from the stem, especially on its lower part and about the bases of the leaves, are at first milk-white but become yellow by exposure to light and air. It is not the practice, so far as he observed, to wound the plant for the purpose of causing the

juice to exude more freely, nor is the gathering of the gum in this district any special object of industry. The plant is called in Persian Khassuih, and in the Mazanderan dialect Boridsheh.

4

2. F. rubricaulis Boiss.2 (F. erubescens Boiss. ex parte, Aucher exsicc. n. 4614, Kotschy n. 666).—This plant was collected by Kotschy in gorges of the Kuh Dinar range in Southern Persia, and probably by Aucher-Eloy on the mountain of Dalmkuh, in Northern Persia. Borszczow, who regards it as the same as the preceding (though Boissier places it in a different section of the genus), says on the authority of Buhse, that it occurs locally throughout the whole of Northern Persia, is found in plenty on the slopes of Elwund near Hamadan, here and there on the edge of the great central salt-desert of Persia, on the mountains near Subzawar, between Ghurian and Kháf, west of Herat, and on the desert plateau west of Kháf. He states, though not from personal observation, that its gum-resin which constitutes Persian Galbanum, is collected for commercial purposes around Hamadan. F. rubricaulis Boiss. has been beautifully figured by Berg under the name of F. erubescens.

6

History-Galbanum, in Hebrew Chelbenah, was an ingredient of the incense used in the worship of the ancient Israelites, and is mentioned by the earliest writers on medicine as Hippocrates and Theophrastus. Dioscorides states it to be the juice of a Narthex growing in Syria, and describes its characters, and the method of purifying it by hot water exactly as followed in modern times. We find it mentioned in the 2nd century among the drugs on which duty was levied at the Roman custom house at Alexandria.8 Under the name of Kinnah it was well known to the Arabians, and through them to the physicians of the school of Salerno.

In the journal of expenses of John, king of France, during his captivity in England, A.D. 1359-60, there is an entry for the purchase of 1 lb. of Galbanum which cost 16s., 1 tb. of Sagapenum (Serapin) at the same time costing only 2s. In common with other products of the East, these drugs used to reach England by way of Venice and are mentioned among the exports of that city to London in 1503.10

An edict of Henry III. of France promulgated in 1581, gives the prices per Hb. of the gum-resins of the Umbellifera as follows:-Opopanax 32 sols, Sagapenum 22 sols, Asafoetida 15 sols, Galbanum 10 sols, Ammoniacum 6 sols 6 deniers.11

Description-Galbanum is met with in drops or tears, adhering inter se into a mass, usually compact and hard, but sometimes found so soft as to be fluid. The tears are of the size of a lentil to that of a hazel-nut, translucent, and of various shades of light brown, yellowish

1 Buhse, 1. c.; also Bulletin de la Soc. imp. des Nat. de Moscou, xxiii. (1850) 548.

2 Diagnoses Plantarum novarum præsertim orientalium, ser. ii. fasc. 2 (1856) 92.

3 Op. cit. 36 (see p. 280, note 3). Flora Orientalis, ii. (1872) 995. Berg. u. Schmidt, Offizinelle Gewächse, iv. (1863) tab. 31 b.

6 Exodus xxx. 34.-In imitation of the ancient Jewish custom, Galbanum is a component of the incense used in the Irvingite chapels in London.

7 XaλBárn-Theophr. Hist. Plant, ix. c. 1. 8 Vincent, Commerce of the Ancients, ii. (1807) 692.

9 Doüet d'Arcq, Comptes de l'Argenterie des Rois de France (1851) 236.-The prices must be multiplied by 3 to give a notion of present value.

10 Pasi, Tariffa de Pesi e Misure, Venet. 1521. 204 (1st edition, 1503).

11 Fontanon, Edicts et Ordonnances des Rois de France, ii. (1585) 388.

or faintly greenish. The drug has a peculiar, not unpleasant, aromatic odour, and a disagreeable, bitter, alliaceous taste.

In one variety, the tears are dull and waxy, of a light yellowish tint when fresh, but becoming of an orange-brown by keeping; they are but little disposed to run together, and are sometimes quite dry and loose, with an odour that somewhat reminds one of savine. In recent importations of this form of galbanum, we have noticed a considerable admixture of thin transverse slices of the root of the plant, an inch or more in diameter.

Chemical Composition-Galbanum contains volatile oil, resin and mucilage. The first, of which 7 per cent. may be obtained by distillation with water, is a colourless liquid, boiling at 160-165° C., and having the odour of the drug; it deviates the ray of polarized light to the right, and yields when treated with dry hydrochloric acid, a crystalline compound, C10H16, HCI.

The resin, which we find to constitute about 60 per cent. of the drug, is very soft, and dissolves in ether or in alkaline liquids, even in milk of lime, but only partially in bisulphide of carbon. When heated for some time at 100° C. with hydrochloric acid, it yields about 0.8 per cent. of Umbelliferone, CHO3, which may be dissolved from the acid liquid by means of ether or chloroform; it is obtained on evaporation in colourless acicular crystals. Umbelliferone is soluble in water; its solution exhibits, especially on addition of an alkali, a brilliant blue fluorescence which is destroyed by an acid. If a small fragment of galbanum is immersed in water, no fluorescence is observed, but it is immediately produced by a drop of ammonia. The same phenomenon takes place with asafoetida, and in a slight degree with ammoniacum; it is probably due to traces of umbelliferone pre-existing in those drugs.

Umbelliferone is also produced from many other aromatic umbelliferous plants, as Angelica, Levisticum, and Meum, when their respective resins are submitted to dry distillation. According to Zwenger (1860) it may be likewise obtained from the resin of Daphne Mezereum L. The yield is always small; it is highest in galbanum, but even in this, does not much exceed 0.8 per cent. reckoned on the crude drug.

By submitting galbanum-resin to dry distillation, Mössmer (1861) obtained a thick oil of an intense and brilliant blue,2 which was noticed as early as 1751 by Caspar Neumann of Berlin. It is a liquid having a slightly aromatic odour and a bitter acrid taste. Kachler (1871) found that it could be resolved by fractional distillation into a colourless oil having the formula C10H16, and a blue oil to which he assigned the composition C10H16O, or perhaps more correctly C40H6404, boiling at 289° C. As to the hydrocarbon, it boils at 240° C., and therefore differs from the essential oil obtained when galbanum is distilled with water. The blue oil, after due purification agrees, according to Kachler, with the blue oil of the flowers of Matricaria Chamomilla L. Each may be transformed

1 This remarkable property of umbelliferone may be beautifully shown by dipping some bibulous paper into water which has stood for an hour or two on lumps of galbanum, and drying it. A strip of this paper placed in a test tube of water with a drop of ammonia, will give a superb blue solution,

instantly losing its colour on the addition of a drop of hydrochloric acid.

2 We have found it best to mix the galbanum-resin with coarsely powdered pumicestone; the oil is then easily and abundantly obtainable.