Page:Indian Medicinal Plants (Text Part 1).djvu/335

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N.O.RUFACEÆ.
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above. It, therefore, demands an especial notice of the medical profession.

" Six drachms of the tincture or twelve ounces of the decoction of T. aculeata are equal to one bottle of Warburg's tincture ; and if either of them is used in two doses during the presence of simple continued fever or a paroxysm of ague, it produces the same good effect as the latter drug (Warburg's tincture), namely, a copious perspiration and relief of the febrile condition ; and, again, if the tincture or decoction is repeated in the same dose during the interval of ague, every fourth or fifth hour, for two or three days, it prevents the return of paroxysm as successfully as very large doses of quinine. To render the cure more perfect and complete, the tincture or decoction should be continued in smaller doses for four of five days more. The beneficial influence of the tincture or decoction of T. aculeata in remittent fever is precisely the same, and the only difference is that it sometimes relieves the exacerbation and checks its return at once; and at others, it first converts the remittent into intermittent fever and then cures the latter in the same way as explained above. Out of the many severe and very obstinate cases of malarious, jungle, and other fevers, which yielded to this drug, there were several in which quinine with arsenic was first tried and failed. As the dose of the tincture of T. aculeata is much smaller than that of its decoction, and as it can also be prepared and kept always ready for use, it is preferable to the latter; but there is no difference whatever between the medical properties of both preparations.

" The root-bark of T. aculeata is not only much cheaper than quinine and Warburg's tincture, but is also one of the cheapest drugs in Southern India, its price being only about 2 annas per pound. In addition to this, its advantages over quinine are that it, unlike the latter, can be freely and successfully administered in the absence as well as in the presence of fever ; and that, however long and frequently it may be employed, it never produces ringing in the ears, deafness and some other disagreeable symptoms which are so commonly observed in the use of quinine.