LIOUORICE ROOT
.—This is an article so much in use with HORSES, (in a pulverized state,) that it is absolutely necessary it should undergo some degree of elucidation; to prevent, if possible, a part of the medical deception, and adulteration, which so universally prevails. Liquorice root is plentifully produced in most countries of Europe, and is in all held in the same degree of estimation for its utility. What is grown in England is preferable to what is brought from abroad; the latter being generally mouldy, and in a perishing state, which it will always soon become, if not kept in a dry place, or buried in sand. It is remarkable for its peculiar property of allaying thirst, particularly as it is the almost only sweet known so to do: it is in constant use as an article of much medicinal efficacy with the human species, both as a most excellent PECTORAL and DETERGENT, as well as to soften acrimonious humors, reduce glandular irritability in colds, and promote expectoration.
The article called Spanish liquorice is an extract prepared from the root in Spain, and other countries, where it is cultivated in large quantities; but it is rarely to be met with in the shops in a state of purity and perfection; those who are the makers being either very slovenly in the preparation, or interested in the event, constantly mixing it with sand, (or other impurities,) to enlarge the weight, and increase the profit; under which disadvantages it is universally known as, and experimentally proved to be, a pectoral balsamic of general utility. In respect to what is dispensed at the shops, under the name of LIQUORICE POWDER, it is only necessary to observe, that it may be purchased at any for little more than half what the real dried root can be bought and powdered for by the first wholesale houses in the Metropolis. The deception is clear, and self-evident; as it is an article of great consumption, so it becomes the more properly appropriate to the pecuniary purpose of adulteration: those who best know the advantage arising from such practice, best can tell, that two pound weight of GENUINE LIQUORICE ROOT, ground in the drug mill, and there incorporated with the customary proportions of bean meal and wheat flour, will make fourteen pounds of most excellent liquorice powder for retail; and is the very article with which the public are supplied as a substitute for a medicine of so much efficacy, that it is to be regretted it should so easily become a matter of such general prostitution. See Adulteration.