- Tonics are substances which gently and persistently stimulate and invigorate the human system, especially the nutritive and blood-making functions. I have already given several of them in the preceding matter and will mention but a few here. Some of the best tonics have a fair share of the electrical colors also. Vegetable tonics are generally bitter and appetizing. Quinine and Iron are called the most important tonics.
- Quassia
Yellowish, flowers sometimes red. “Highly tonic.”
- Gold Thread (Coptis)
Roots of a golden color. “Tonic bitter.”
- Gentian (Gentiana)
“Yellowish powder.” “Tonic.”
- Peruvian Bark (Cinchona)
Pale, yellow, and red varieties. “Excites warmth in the epigastrium,” etc. “Nausea and vomiting,” also “purging” sometimes caused. “Frequency of the pulse is increased.” Its action upon the nervous system is often evinced by a sense of tension, or fullness, or slight pain in the head, singing in the ears, and partial deafness.” Its most important extract is Quinine or Quinia, whose component parts are as follows, NC20H12O2.
- Iron
Already described, see III of this chapter.
- Myrrh (Myrrha)
“Reddish yellow or reddish brown.” “Tonic and stimulating, with a tendency to the lungs and uterus.”
- Ginger (Zingiber)
“Yellowish brown.” “A powerful stimulant.”
- Black Pepper (Piper Nigrum)
“Piperin, the active principle of pepper, is in transparent crystals—as ordinarily procured it is yellow.” Formula of piperin, according to Wertheim, N2C70H37O10. “Black pepper is a warm, carminative stimulant, capable of producing general arterial excitement.”