WHAT IS MONESIA? BY E. DUPUY, PHARMACEUTIST, NEW YORK CITY.
Dorvault in the Officine gives it “as the product of a foreign bark never found in commerce, but described by Mr. Bernard Derosne, (who, according to the same authority is the only possessor of it,) as being found in voluminous thick pieces, filled with extractive. The color is dark brown, excepting the epidermis which is grayish. It contains tannin and a red coloring matter, analoguous to cinchonic red, also an acrid one and salts.” Virey attributed it to a Chrysophi lum.; Martens says it is the Mohica of the Brazilians; according to Mr. Constant Berrier, it bears in that country sundry other names: furanhem, guaranhem, buranché, etc. Duchesne in his Répertoire des Plantes utiles et Vénéncuses du Globe, and Descourtils in his Flore médicale des Antilles mentions the Cainito Chrysophillum the bark of which is tonic, astringent and febrifuge. In {168} examining some extract of Monesia I was struck with the striking resemblance in its properties with the extract of logwood, (Hematoxylon Campechianum) both possessing the same astringent sweetish taste, precipitating salts of iron, etc. Descourtils, who practiced medicine for a long time in the West India islands, says “it is recommendable in dysentery and diarrhea after the inflammatory period.” and to that effect prescribes the decoction of one ounce of the wood or a drachm of the extract added to an infusion of orange tree leaves, or Cascarilla bark, per diem. Besides, Dr. Wood in the U. S. Dispensatory, mentions its frequent use in some parts of the United States, “in that relaxed condition of the bowels, which is apt to succeed to cholera infantum,” and also in the same complaints as mentioned by Descourtils. Though both the decoction of the wood and the solution of the extract are officinal in our national Pharmacopeia, so far as my means of observation go, they are seldom, if ever, prescribed in New York, and yet I have repeatedly prepared solutions of the Monesia, prescribed by our city practitioners. The extract of log-wood being so similar in its medicinal action, I am strongly inclined to think that it is the same substance, though perhaps obtained from other sources; and as the price of it is so much higher than that of the other, it would be desirable to obtain the results of comparative experiments made to test their relative value, and whether the extract of Hematoxylon Campechianum should not be prescribed as answering for all therapeutical purposes, the mysterious Monesia of Derosne?
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THE PHARMACOLOGY OF MATICO: WITH FORMULA FOR ITS PREPARATION. BY DORVAULT.
As matico is daily attracting more and more the attention of practitioners, its pharmacology demands consideration. It is well known that this new Peruvian plant has been lauded as an efficacious remedy in leucorrhea and gonorrhea, as a vulnerary, and above all as an excellent hemostatic, both external and internal.
We shall, in the present paper, content ourselves with making known the principal pharmaceutical forms which this substance is capable of assuming, reserving all other considerations for a later period. A long and careful experience will be needed to establish the relative value of each of the subjoined forms.
POWDER OF MATICO.
Matico can be easily reduced to an impalpable powder. This powder is of a yellowish green, and its odor, when fresh is more fragrant than that of the plant itself. To preserve it well, it should be kept in well stopped bottles.