The influence and development of some of the researches of Daniel Hanbury / by Frederick B. Power.

  • Power, Frederick B. (Frederick Belding), 1853-1927.
Date:
[1913]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The influence and development of some of the researches of Daniel Hanbury / by Frederick B. Power. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    of this Society, and whose memory will always be revered wherever pharmacy is known. 1 have, therefore, chosen as my theme “The Influence and Development of Some of the Researches of Daniel Hanbury.” Before proceeding to the principal part of my subject I would like to make a slight digression in order to recall some incidents that are not entirely disconnected from it, and which are now somewhat vividly brought to my mind. It was not my privilege ever to have met Daniel Hanbury, but so long ago as the time when I was a student of phar- macy I became familiar with his name and writings, and ever since that time I have felt that I knew him. The first time that his name was brought prominently to my notice was in the course of lectures in materia medica given at the Phila- delphia College of Pharmacy during the session of 1873-1874 by my honoured teacher, the late Professor John M. Maisch. It was the custom of Professor Maisch not to restrict his teaching to the statements of the text-books, but, with char- acteristic thoioughness, he brought to his students the latest results of scientific investigation in the special field of study to which he was devoted. At about the time referred to it had been shown by Mr. Hanbury, in a most interesting paper (.Pharrn. J., 1873, 33, 81, 102), that the true Pareira Brava, or the root to which the reputation of the drug as a medicinal agent is due, was not derived from Gissampelos Pareira, Linne, as stated in the Pharmacopoeias and text-books of that period, and as had, indeed, been assumed for over a century, but that the plant yielding it was Chondodendron tomentosum, Ruiz and Pavon. It was, furthermore, shown that the so- called Pareira Brava which then occurred in commerce was for the most part of unknown botanical origin and of doubt- ful medicinal value. Thus the name of Daniel Hanbury first became familiar to me, and although many things have passed from mind during the somewhat long interval of years, the source and characters of at least one South American drug had become firmly fixed in mv memory. It was also at about the time indicated—namely, in 1874— that the classical work ‘ Pharmacographia ’ appeared, the result of the joint labours of Mr. Hanbury and his friend, Professor Fliickiger. The influence which this work was des- tined to exert in so many directions Mr. Hanbury was, unfor- tunately, not permitted to see, for he passed away in the early part of the following year. The interest which had been awakened in the subject of the chemistry and natural history of drugs through the publi- cation of * Pharmacographia ’ was not confined to the British Isles, but extended across the Atlantic, and even to more remote parts of the world. So far as I can remember, it was largely due to the impression this work had produced that I was led shortly thereafter, in 1876, to seek instruction from one of its authors at the University of Strassburg. Although