"Take of sarsaparilla root, sliced, five ounces; boiling distilled water, four pints. Macerate for four hours in a vessel lightly covered, and placed near the fire; then take out the sarsaparilla, and bruise it. Return the bruised root again to the liquor, and macerate in a similar manner for two hours. Afterwards boil it down to two pints, and strain."

Decoctum Smilacis Sarsaparillae, Edin. Decoction of Sarsaparilla.

"Take of sarsaparilla, sliced, six ounces; water, eight pounds. Digest for two hours in a temperature of about 195°; then take out the root and bruise it: in this state put it again into the liquor, and boil it with a gentle fire down to four pounds; then express it, and strain."

Sun. Decoction de Sarsaparille (F.), Sarsaparille-dekokte (S.), Decotto di Sarsaparilla (I.).•

We have already stated the claims which sarsaparilla has to the attention of the practitioner as a remedy in syphilis. The above formulae display a great deficiency of enquiry in those who introduced them into the pharmacopoeias; for, as the whole of the active matter of the root resides in the cortical part, and can be extracted from this by moderate coction, there is no necessity for the various macerations and boilings ordered by the Colleges; which, in fact, injure the remedy. The entire root, merely bruised, and macerated in water at 180° Fahr., yields up all its medicinal properties.2 This decoction may be regarded as useful during the exhibition of mercury; and is found to be so in dysuria, and incontinence of urine arising from a morbid irritability of the bladder. It affords precipitates with lime-water, solution of chloride of barium, and of acetate of lead, which are incompatible in formulae with it.