Travels in Peru and India While Superintending the Collection of Chinchona Plants and Seeds in South America, and Their Introduction into India
9781465652805
100 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
The whole world, and especially all tropical countries where intermittent fevers prevail, have long been indebted to the mountainous forests of the Andes for that inestimable febrifuge which has now become indispensable, and the demand for which is rapidly increasing, while the supply decreases, throughout all civilized countries. There is probably no drug which is more valuable to man than the febrifugal alkaloid which is extracted from the chinchona-trees of South America; and few greater blessings could be conferred on the human race than the naturalization of these trees in India, and other congenial regions, so as to render the supply more certain, cheaper, and more abundant. It will be the principal object of the following pages to relate the measures which have been adopted within the last two years to collect plants and seeds of these quinine-yielding chinchonæ, in the various regions of South America, where the most valuable species are found; and to give an account of their introduction into India, and of the hill districts in that country where it is considered most likely that they will thrive. But it is necessary that the reader should have a general knowledge of these precious trees, and of their history, before he accompanies the explorers who were sent in search of them over the cordilleras of the Andes, and into the vast untrodden forests. It would be strange indeed, if, as is generally supposed, the Indian aborigines of South America were ignorant of the virtues of Peruvian bark; yet the absence of this sovereign remedy in the wallets of itinerant native doctors who have plied their trade from father to son, since the time of the Incas, certainly gives some countenance to this idea. It seems probable, nevertheless, that the Indians were aware of the virtues of Peruvian bark in the neighbourhood of Loxa, 230 miles south of Quito, where its use was first made known to Europeans: and the Indian name for the tree quina-quina, "bark of bark," indicates that it was believed to possess some special medicinal properties. The Indians looked upon their conquerors with dislike and suspicion; it is improbable that they would be quick to impart knowledge of this nature to them; and the interval which elapsed between the discovery and settlement of the country and the first use of Peruvian bark by Europeans may thus easily be explained. The conquest and subsequent civil wars in Peru cannot be said to have been finally concluded until the time of the viceroy Marquis of Cañete, in 1560; and J. de Jussieu reports that a Jesuit, who had a fever at Malacotas, was cured by Peruvian bark in 1600. M. La Condamine also found a manuscript in the library of a convent at Loxa, in which it was stated that the Europeans of the province used the bark at about the same time. Thus an interval of only forty years intervened between the pacification of Peru and the discovery of its most valuable product. It may be added, however, that though the Indians were aware of the febrifugal qualities of this bark, they attached little importance to them, and this may be another reason for the lapse of time which occurred before the knowledge was imparted to the Spaniards. Referring to this circumstance La Condamine says, "Nul n'est saint dans son pays." This indifference to, and in many cases even prejudice against the use of the Peruvian bark, amongst the Indians, is very remarkable. Poeppig, writing in 1830, says that in the Peruvian province of Huanuco the people, who are much subject to tertian agues, have a strong repugnance to its use.
