Page:A History of Hindu Chemistry Vol 1.djvu/121

 Dutt says: "We cannot help admiring the ingenuity and the boldness of the Hindu physicians, when we find that they were freely and properly using such powerful drugs as arsenic, mercury, iron, etc., when the Mussulman Hakims around them with imperial patronage and the boasted learning of the West, recording such remarks regarding them as the following:—

"Soomboolkhar, 'the white oxide of arsenic.—' There are six kinds of this, one name Sunkia, the third Godanta, the fourth Darma, the fifth Huldea. The Yunāni physicians do not allow this to form a part of their prescriptions, as they believe it destroys the vital principle. The physicians of India, on the contrary, find these drugs more effectual in many disorders than others of less power such as the calx of metals. For this reason too I am in the habit of seldom giving these remedies internally, but I usually confine my use of them to external application and as aphrodisiacs which I prescribe to a few friends, who may have derived no benefit from Yunāni prescriptions. It is better to use as few of them as possible."

"Pārā, 'Mercury.'—It is very generally used throughout India in many ways, both in its native