In connection with the work of Drug-Plant Investigations many inquiries
are received from various parts of the country asking for a list of the
drug-producing plants of the regions concerned and for information as
to the parts of the plants used in medicine, etc. It being impossible
to comply with requests of this nature in any satisfactory way, Miss
Henkel was asked to compile a list of the drug plants of this country,
using as a basis the catalogues of dealers in crude drugs and the
standard works on systematic botany. It has seemed from an inspection
of these lists and of much current pharmaceutical literature that the
recent changes in botanical nomenclature have succeeded one another
too rapidly to permit the drug dealer and the pharmacist to keep pace
with them. This has resulted in considerable confusion in regard to
botanical names, and in some cases in the matter of the common names of
drug-producing plants. In such a list as that herewith presented the
opportunity for helping to clear up this situation has seemed worth
improving. The recent appearance of the new Pharmacopœia, in which the
botanical nomenclature has been revised, has seemed to emphasize the
desirability of making this attempt, since the names in the case of
official plants will be fairly definitely fixed among pharmacists for
the next ten years. In the accompanying list the pharmacopœial names
are given and a revision of the nomenclature of the unofficial drugs is
also presented. Mr. Frederick V. Coville, Botanist, has kindly revised
the botanical names used in this publication.
It is hoped that this compilation will tend to unify usage among those
who have to do with crude drugs and drug plants.
RODNEY H. TRUE,
_Physiologist in Charge_
OFFICE OF DRUG-PLANT INVESTIGATIONS,
_Washington, D. C., October 12, 1905_.