. General therapeutics and materia medica: adapted for a medical textbook (Volume 2). d, is readily reduced to a yellowish-brown powder. Its odour isfeeble and peculiar; taste at first sweet, but afterwards intensely yields its virtues readily to water, alcohol, and wine, which are,therefore, used as menstrua for certain officinal preparations. Whensubjected to analysis, it is found to consist mainly of bitter extractive,traces of volatile oil—oil of gentian;—gum, an uncrystallizable princi-ple, and gentisic acid or gentisin. MM. Henry and Caventou believed,that they had succeeded in
. General therapeutics and materia medica: adapted for a medical textbook (Volume 2). d, is readily reduced to a yellowish-brown powder. Its odour isfeeble and peculiar; taste at first sweet, but afterwards intensely yields its virtues readily to water, alcohol, and wine, which are,therefore, used as menstrua for certain officinal preparations. Whensubjected to analysis, it is found to consist mainly of bitter extractive,traces of volatile oil—oil of gentian;—gum, an uncrystallizable princi-ple, and gentisic acid or gentisin. MM. Henry and Caventou believed,that they had succeeded in separating, by means of ether, an activeneutral crystalline principle of a yellow colour, in which the bitternessof the root was concentrated, and to which they gave the name Gen-Imnin; but this has since been shown to be impure gentisic acid; andwhen the crystals are entirely free from impurities, they are devoid ofbitterness. (Leconte, Trommsdorff.) The bitter principle of gentianhas not yet been isolated. Gentian, as already remarked, is one of the bitters most extensively. Gentiana lutca. GENTIANA. 37 prescribed. It is, indeed, calculated to fulfil all the objects for whichthe simple bitter tonics are employed. Accordingly, it may be givenin atonic dyspepsia, simple or complicated; as well as in convalescencefrom acute diseases; and in want of tone, howsoever induced. It isan ingredient of the celebrated Duke of Portlands powder for the Gout,which consisted of equal quantities of the roots of gentian and birth-wort (Aristolochia rotunda), the tops and leaves of germander (Chamce-drys), ground pine (Chamcepitys), and lesser centaury (Chironia centau-rium), powdered, and mixed together. This powder, as well as gentianitself, was at one time thought to possess the power of arresting aparoxysm of gout, and of eradicating the disease; and, as the affec-tion is connected with derangement of the gastro-enteric functions, itmay, doubtless, often be serviceable; but it need sca
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