Nat. Ord., Algæ.
Common Names, Sea-wrack. Bladder-wrack. Sea-kelp.
Preparation.—The fresh alga gathered in May or June are pounded to a pulp and macerated in two parts by weight of alcohol.
(The following letter, by Dr. J. Herbert Knapp to the Homœopathic Recorder, was published in 1896):
After treating many cases of exophthalmic goitre, I have come to the conclusion that I have found a specific for that disease in Fucus vesiculosis (sea-wrack). I might record one case. Mrs. Mary B., æt. 24 years, German, came into my clinic at the Brooklyn E. D. Homœopathic Dispensary to be treated for swelling of the neck of several years' duration. I gave her the tincture of Fucus ves., thirty drops three times a day. The treatment began December 1, 1895, and patient was discharged cured, on October 2, 1896. Would be pleased to hear from any others who have had any experience with Fucus vesiculosis.
(The foregoing brought out this by Dr. R. N. Foster, of Chicago):
It gives me great pleasure to be able to say a word confirmatory of the remarks made in your December issue by J. Herbert Knapp, M. D., respecting the above named drug.
Twenty years ago, while turning over the pages of that very useful book, "The American Eclectic Dispensatory," by John King, M. D., I chanced to notice the following sentences: "Fucus vesiculosis, sea-wrack, or bladder-wrack,... has a peculiar odor, and a nauseous saline taste.... The charcoal of this plant has long had the reputation of a deobstruent, and been given in goitre and scrofulous swelling."
So far as I now remember, this is the only hint I ever received which led me to try the drug in goitre. At the same time, I do not feel sure of this. Perhaps I had met in some medical journal a statement respecting the relation of this drug to goitre, which fact led me to look it up in the "Eclectic Dispensatory." But if so, I cannot recall the authority. At all events, I was led to try the remedy in a pronounced case of goitre, with such good results that I have never since given any other remedy for that disease, either in the exophthalmic or in the uncomplicated form. And what is more, I have never known it to fail to cure when the patient was under thirty years of age. After that time of life, or about that period, it seems to be no longer efficacious.
I have now used it on more than twenty-four cases, with the same unvarying result, and never with any other result—that is, no unpleasant consequences have ever accompanied or followed its use.
I published this fact in the Medical Investigator after I had used it in a few cases, and again announced it in the Chicago Homœopathic Medical Society still later; and again have frequently repeated it with growing confidence and of greater numbers of cases in medical societies, in colleges, and in private conversation with physicians.
And yet the fact is so utterly unknown that your journal publishes Dr. Knapp's inquiry respecting it, which shows how easily a good thing may be forgotten, and how readily a genuine specific may be superseded by a host of abortive procedures right under the eyes of the profession. It is most probable that more real good things have been forgotten or cast aside in medicine than it now, or at any one time, possesses.