Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 2 (1876).djvu/322

294, that no roots under eight years' growth furnished a good drug; and that, even with these, much depended on the time of gathering, the after-treatment, and especially the drying ; further, it appeared that only the parent root and not the branches furnished the strongest medicine; but as the former was liable to decay, the cultivation was difficult. Such were among the principal causes which combined to disappoint the expectations which had been formed of the garden rhubarb. An opinion, moreover, gained ground among merchants as well as among physicians, that the Chinese quality was superior. Nevertheless R. palmatum would have gradually made its way, had not doubts of its being the parent plant of the genuine Rhubarb soon been expressed direct from Russia. Pallas showed the Chinese in Kiakhta dried specimens of R. palmatum, and believed their assurances that this was not the true plant, but that it was smaller, and had an undivided leaf, besides other falsehoods.

Sievers, who travelled, between 1791-1795, along the whole Siberian-Chinese frontier, by order of the Russian Government, to study the Rhubarb question, also heard a confirmation of the same story from the Chinese in Kiakhta. Relying on these statements, they asserted that the original plant of the genuine Rhubarb was still unknown. This, doubtless, gave a severe blow to the cultivation of R. palmatum; and as another Indian species (R. australe) was about this time introduced into England, which appeared to answer better to the Chinese description, everyone turned their attention to it, and R. palmatum gradually disappeared from our gardens. It was soon evident that R. australe furnished but a bad root, and many authorities, especially Guibourt, луеге firm in their support of the R. palmatum as the only kind which at all equalled in appearance and property the genuine Chinese root; but the mischief was done and could not be easily repaired, for though the interest was still as great as ever, it had become extremely difficult to procure a fresh supply of plants.

It was reserved for Lieut.-Col. Prejevalsky to decide finally the vexata quæstio of the parent plant of the