lxviii INTRODUCTION
or to extinction, but to other conditions, which tend to prevent identification at the time of collection." This shows also the necessity of rational cultivation, and hence of medicinal farms.*
Many have been disappointed from the use of indigenous drugs for which the cause is not far to seek. A writer in the Calcutta Review for 1869 (p : 199) said : —
" The distrust of bazar medicines is, we are convinced, well warranted by facts. In many cases bazar medicines are simple trash. Let any one only look at the system of storage followed in a paiisaris shop, and one very evident reason of this will be apparent. His wares are of all degrees of staleness, the stock of many of them inherited from his father or grandfather and long ago inert. Stoppered bottles are things unknown, and all substances are alike stowed in bags or earthen vessels, exposed to every variation of the atmosphere in respect of heat and moisture, and to the attack of every kind of insect. * * * Many are adulterated, and as a matter of course, none are labelled."
The above also shows the necessity of medicinal farms and the establishment of depots for the supply of reliable preparations of indigenous drugs.
It is the bounden duty of educated Indians to do all that lies in their power for the proper study of Indian medicinal plants and drugs. In 1879, the Calcutta Review wrote : —
1 The resuscitation of Indian medical science is a noble and useful work which ought to be performed by educated Hin- doos. * * It is perfectly true that Indian drugs ought to be largely studied and used by medical practitioners in this country. European medical men fully admit this truth and some of them have labored earnestly and assiduously to accomplish this object. But it is easy to understand that the efforts of foreigners must be necessarily imperfect and unproductive of adequate results. Upon educated Indian members of the pro- fession, therefore, devolves this great and solemn duty, for it is they alone who can discharge it adequately and well. * * In India the foreign and the indigenous systems ought to be read together if full benefit is to be derived from either." B. D. BASIL
- A few enterprising Ayurvedic practitioners of Calcutta have established such farms in the neighbourhood of that city. But these are on small scale.
