CORTEX WINTERANUS.

Botanical Origin—Drimys[77] Winteri Forster, a tree distributed throughout the American continent from Mexico to Cape Horn. It presents considerable variation in form and size of leaf and flower in the different countries in which it occurs, on which account it has received from botanists several distinct specific names. Hooker[78] has reduced these species to a single type, a course in which he has been followed by Eichler in his monograph of the small order Winteraceæ[79].—In April, 1877, the tree was blossoming in the open air in the botanic garden at Dublin.

History—In 1577 Captain Drake, afterwards better known as Sir Francis Drake, having obtained from Queen Elizabeth a commission to conduct a squadron to the South Seas, set sail from Plymouth with five ships; and having abandoned two of his smaller vessels, passed into the Pacific Ocean by the Straits of Magellan in the autumn of the following year. But on the 7th September, 1578, there arose a dreadful storm, which dispersed the little fleet. Drake’s ship, the Pelican, was driven southward, the Elizabeth, under the command of Captain Winter, repassed the Straits and returned to England, while the third vessel, the Marigold, was heard of no more.

Winter remained three weeks in the Straits of Magellan to recover the health of his crew, during which period, according to Clusius (the fact is not mentioned in Hakluyt’s account of the voyage), he collected a certain aromatic bark, of which, having removed the acridity by steeping it in honey, he made use as a spice and medicine for scurvy during his voyage to England, where he arrived in 1579.

A specimen of this bark having been presented to Clusius, he gave it the name of Cortex Winteranus, and figured and described it in his pamphlet: “Aliquot notæ in Garciæ aromatum historiam,” Antverpiæ, 1582, p. 30, and also in the Libri Exoticorum, published in 1605. He afterwards received a specimen with wood attached, which had been collected by the Dutch navigator Sebald de Weerdt.

Van Noort, another well-known Dutch navigator, who visited the Straits of Magellan in 1600, mentions cutting wood at Port Famine to make a boat, and that the bark of the trees was hot and biting like pepper. It is stated by Murray that he also brought the bark to Europe.

But although the straits of Magellan were several times visited about this period, it is certain that no regular communication between that remote region and Europe existed either then or subsequently; and we may reasonably conclude that Winter’s Bark became a drug of great rarity, and known to but few persons. It thus happened that, notwithstanding most obvious differences, the Canella alba of the West Indies, and another bark of which we shall speak further on, having been found to possess the pungency of Winter’s Bark, were (owing to the scarcity of the latter) substituted for it, until at length the peculiar characters of the original drug came to be entirely forgotten.

The tree was figured by Sloane in 1693, from a specimen (still extant in the British Museum) brought from Magellan’s Straits by Handisyd, a ship’s surgeon, who had experienced its utility in treating scurvy.

Feuillée,[80] a French botanist, found the Winter’s Bark-tree in Chili (1709-11), and figured it as Boigue cinnamomifera. It was, however, Forster,[81] the botanist of Cook’s second expedition round the world, who first described the tree accurately, and named it Drimys Winteri. He met with it in 1773 in Magellan’s Straits, and on the eastern coasts of Tierra del Fuego, where it grows abundantly, forming an evergreen tree of 40 feet, while on the western shores it is but a shrub of 10 feet high. Specimens have been collected in these and adjacent localities by many subsequent botanists, among others by Dr. J. D. Hooker, who states that about Cape Horn the tree occurs from the sea-level to an elevation of 1000 feet.

Although the bark of Drimys was never imported as an article of trade from Magellan’s Straits, it has in recent times been occasionally brought into the market from other parts of South America, where it is in very general use. Yet so little are drug dealers acquainted with it, that its true name and origin have seldom been recognized.[82]

Description—We have examined specimens of true Winter’s Bark from the Straits of Magellan, Chili, Peru, New Granada, and Mexico, and find in each the same general characters. The bark is in quills or channelled pieces, often crooked, twisted or bent backwards, generally only a few inches in length. It is most extremely thick (⅒ to ³/₁₀ of an inch) and appears to have shrunk very much in drying, bark a quarter of an inch thick having sometimes rolled itself into a tube only three times as much in external diameter. Young pieces have an ashy-grey suberous coat beset with lichens. In older bark, the outer coat is sometimes whitish and silvery, but more often of a dark rusty brown, which is the colour of the internal substance, as well as of the surface next the wood. The inner side of the bark is strongly characterized by very rough striæ, or, as seen under a lens, by small short and sharp longitudinal ridges, with occasional fissures indicative of great contraction of the inner layer in drying. In a piece broken or cut transversely, it is easy to perceive that the ridges in question are the ends of rays of white liber which diverge towards the circumference in radiate order, a dark rusty parenchyme intervening between them. No such feature is ever observable in either Canella or Cinnamodendron.

Winter’s Bark has a short, almost earthy fracture, an intolerably pungent burning taste, and an odour which can only be described as terebinthinous. When fresh its smell may be more agreeable. The descriptions of Clusius, as alluded to above, are perfectly agreeing and even his figures as nearly as might be expected.

Microscopic Structure—In full-grown specimens the most striking fact is the predominance of sclerenchymatous cells. The tissue moreover contains numerous large oil-ducts, chiefly in the inner portion of the large medullary rays. A fibrous structure of the inner part of the bark is observable only in the youngest specimens.[83] Very small starch granules are met with in the drug, yet less numerous than in canella. The tissue of the former assumes a blackish blue colour on addition of perchloride of iron.

The wood of Drimys consists of dotted prosenchyme, traversed by medullary rays, the cells of which are punctuated and considerably larger than in Coniferæ.

Chemical Composition—No satisfactory chemical examination has been made of true Winter’s Bark. Its chief constituents, as already pointed out, are tannic matters and essential oil, probably also a resin. In a cold aqueous infusion, a considerable amount of mucilage is indicated by neutral acetate of lead. On addition of potash it yields a dark somewhat violet liquid. Canella alba is but little altered by the same treatment. By reason of its astringency the bark is used in Chili for tanning.[84]

Uses—Winter’s Bark is a stimulating tonic and antiscorbutic, now almost obsolete in Europe. It is much used in Brazil and other parts of South America as a remedy in diarrhœa and gastric debility.

Substitute—False Winter’s Bark—We have shown that the bark of Drimys or True Winter’s Bark has been confounded with the pungent bark of Canella alba L., and with an allied bark, also the produce of Jamaica. The latter is that of Cinnamodendron corticosum Miers,[85] a tree growing in the higher mountain woods of St. Thomas-in-the-Vale and St. John, but not observed in any other of the West Indian islands than Jamaica. It was probably vaguely known to Sloane when he described the “Wild Cinamon tree, commonly, but falsely, called Cortex Winteranus,” which, he says, has leaves resembling those of Lauro-cerasus; though the tree he figures is certainly Canella alba.[86] Long[87] in 1774, speaks of Wild Cinamon, Canella alba, or Bastard Cortex Winteranus, saying that it is used by most apothecaries instead of the true Cortex Winteranus.

It is probable that both writers really had in view Cinnamodendron, the bark of which has been known and used as Winter’s Bark, both in England and on the continent from an early period up to the present time.[88] It is the bark figured as Cortex Winteranus by Goebel and Kunze[89] and described by Mérat and De Lens,[90] Pereira, and other writers of repute. Guibourt indeed pointed out in 1850 its great dissimilarity to the bark of Drimys and questioned if it could be derived from that genus.

It is a strange fact that the tree should have been confounded with Canella alba L., differing from it as it does in the most obvious manner, not only in form of leaf, but in having the flowers axillary, whereas those of C. alba are terminal. Although Cinnamodendron corticosum is a tree sometimes as much as 90 feet high[91] and must have been well known in Jamaica for more than a century, yet it had no botanical name until 1858 when it was described by Miers[92] and referred to the small genus Cinnamodendron which is closely allied to Canella.

The bark of Cinnamodendron has the general structure of Canella alba. There is the same thin corky outer coat (which is not removed) dotted with round scars, the same form of quills and fracture. But the tint is different, being more or less of a ferruginous brown. The inner surface which is a little more fibrous than in canella, varies in colour, being yellowish, brown, or of a deep chocolate. The bark is violently pungent but not bitter, and has a very agreeable cinnamon-like odour.

In microscopic structure it approaches very close to canella; yet the thick-walled cells of the latter exist to a much larger extent and are here seen to belong to the suberous tissue. The medullary rays are loaded with oxalate of calcium.

Cinnamodendron bark has not been analysed. Its decoction is blackened by a persalt of iron whereby it may be distinguished from Canella alba; and is coloured intense purplish brown by iodine, which is not the case with a decoction of true Winter’s Bark.

FRUCTUS ANISI STELLATI.

Botanical Origin—Illicium anisatum Loureiro (I. religiosum Sieb.). A small tree, 20 to 25 feet high, native of the south-western provinces of China; introduced at an early period into Japan by the Buddhists and planted about their temples.

Kämpfer in his travels in Japan, in 1690-1692, discovered and figured a tree called Somo or Skimmi[94] which subsequent authors assumed to be the source of the drug Star-anise. The tree was also found in Japan by Thunberg[95] who remarked that its capsules are not so aromatic as those found in trade. Von Siebold in 1825 noticed the same fact, in consequence of which he regarded the tree as distinct from that of Loureiro, naming it Illicium Japonicum, a name he changed in 1837 to I. religiosum. Baillon,[96] while admitting certain differences between the fruits of the Chinese and Japanese trees, holds them to constitute but one species, and the same view is taken by Miquel.[97]

The star-anise of commerce is produced in altitudes of 2500 metres in the north-western parts of the province of Yunnan in South-western China where the tree, which attains a height of 12 to 15 feet, grows in abundance.[98] The fruits of the Japanese variety of the tree are not collected, and the Chinese drug alone is in use even in Japan.

History—Notwithstanding its striking appearance, there is no evidence that star-anise found its way to Europe like other Eastern spices during the middle ages. Concerning its ancient use in China, the only fact we have found recorded is, that during the Sung dynasty, a.d. 970-1127, star-anise was levied as tribute in the southern part of Kien-chow, now Yen-ping-fu, in Fokien.[99]

Star-anise was brought to England from the Philippines by the voyager Candish, about a.d. 1588. Clusius obtained it in London from the apothecary Morgan and the druggist Garet, and described it in 1601.[100] The drug appears to have been rare in the time of Pomet, who states (1694) that the Dutch use it to flavour their beverages of tea and “sorbec.”[101] In those times it was brought to Europe by way of Russia, and was thence called Cardamomum Siberiense, or Annis de Sibérie.

Description—The fruit of Illicium anisatum is formed of 8 one-seeded carpels, originally upright, but afterwards spread into a radiate whorl and united in a single row round a short central column which proceeds from an oblique pedicel. When ripe they are woody and split longitudinally at the upturned ventral suture, so that the shining seed becomes visible. This seed, which is elliptical and somewhat flattened, stands erect in the carpel; it is truncated on the side adjoining the central column, and is there attached by an obliquely-rising funicle. The upper edge of the seed is keeled, the lower rounded. The boat-shaped carpels, to the number of 8, are attached to the column through their whole height, but adhere to each other only slightly at the base; the upper or split side of each carpel occupies a nearly horizontal position. The carpels are irregularly wrinkled, especially below, and are more or less beaked at the apex; their colour is a rusty brown. Internally they are of a brighter colour, smooth, and with a cavity in the lower half corresponding to the shape of the seed. The cavity is formed of a separate wall, ½ millim. thick, which, as well as the testa of the seed, distinctly exhibits a radiate structure. The small embryo lies next the hilum in the soft albumen, which is covered by a dark brown endopleura. The seed, which is not much aromatic, amounts to about one-fifth of the entire weight of the fruit.

Star-anise has an agreeable aromatic taste and smell, more resembling fennel than anise, on which account it was at first designated Fœniculum Sinense.[102] When pulverised, it has a subacid after-taste.

Microscopic Structure—The carpels consist of an external, loose, dark brown layer and a thick inner wall, separated by fibro-vascular bundles. The outer layer exhibits numerous large cells, containing pale yellow volatile oil. The inner wall of the carpels consists of woody prosenchyme in those parts which are exterior to the seed cavity, and especially in the shining walls laid bare by the splitting of the ventral suture. The inner surface of the carpel is entirely composed of sclerenchyme. A totally different structure is exhibited by this stony shell where it lines the cavity occupied by the seed. Here it is composed of a single row of cells, consisting of straight tubes exactly parallel to one another, more than 500 mkm. long, and 70 mkm. in diameter, placed vertically to the seed cavity; their porous walls, marked with fine spiral striations, display splendid colours in polarized light. The seed contains albumen and drops of fat. Starch is wanting in star-anise, except a little in the fruit-stalk.

Chemical Composition—The volatile oil amounts to four or five per cent. Its composition is that of the oils of fennel or anise. We observed that oil of star-anise, as distilled by one of us, continued fluid below 8° C. It solidified at that temperature as soon as a crystal of anethol (see our article on Fructus Anisi) was brought in contact with the oil. The crystallized mass began to melt again at 16° C. The oils of anise and star-anise possess no striking optical differences, both deviating very little to the left. We are unable to give any chemical characters by which they can be discriminated, although they are distinguished by dealers; the oil of star-anise imparts a somewhat different flavour, for instance, to drinks than that produced by anise oil.

Star-anise is rich in sugar, which seems to be cane-sugar inasmuch as it does not reduce alkaline cupric tartrate. An aqueous extract of the fruit assumes, on addition of alcohol, the form of a clear mucilaginous jelly, of which pectin is probably a constituent. The seeds contain a large quantity of fixed oil.

Commerce—Star-anise is shipped to Europe and India from China. In 1872 Shanghai imported, mostly by way of Hong Kong 5273 peculs (703,066 lb.), a large proportion of which was re-shipped to other ports of China.[103] According to Rondot (l. c.) the best is first brought by junks from Fokien to Canton, being exported from Tsiouen-tchou-fou. A little is also collected in Kiangsi and Kuang-tung. The same drug, under the name of Bādiyāne-khatāi (i.e. Chinese fennel), is carried by inland trade from China to Yarkand and thence to India, where it is much esteemed.

Uses—Star-anise is employed to flavour spirits, the principal consumption being in Germany, France, and Italy. It is not used in medicine at least in England, except in the form of essential oil, which is often sold for oil of aniseed.