Stem prickly, angular; leaves unarmed, ovate, retuse-mucronate, three-nerved.
This has the root perennial, branchy, externally brown, internally white; stems of the thickness of a man's finger; they are jointed, triangular, and beset with crooked spines The leaves are alternate, smooth, and shining on the upper side; on the other side are three nerves or costæ, with sundry small crooked spines. The flower is yellow mixed with red. The fruit is a black berry, containing several brown seeds.
Sarsaparilla delights in low moist grounds and near the banks of rivers. In such places it thrives well in Jamaica. The roots run superficially under the surface of the ground. The gatherers have only to loosen the soil a little, and to draw out the long fibres with a wooden hook. In this manner they proceed till the whole root is got out. It is then cleared of the mud, dried, and made into bundles.
The sensible qualities of sarsaparilla are mucilaginous and farinaceous, with a slight degree of acrimony. The latter, however, is so slight as not to be perceived by many; and I am apt to believe its medicinal powers may fairly be ascribed to its demulcent and farinaceous qualities.
Since the publication of Sir William Fordyce's paper on sarsaparilla in the Medical Observations and Enquiries, vol. I. sarsaparilla has been in more general use than formerly. The planters in Jamaica supply their estates with great quantities of it; and its exhibition has been attended with very happy consequences in the yaws and in venereal affections; as nodes, typhi, and exostosis, pains of the bones, and carious or cancerous ulcers.
Sir William Fordyce seems to think sarsaparilla a specific in all stages of lues; but, from an attentive and careful observation of its effects in some thousands of cases, I must declare I could place no dependance on sarsaparilla alone. But if mercury had formerly been tried, or was used along with sarsaparilla, a cure was soon effected.—Where the patients had been reduced by pain, disorder, and mercury, I prescribed a decoction of sarsaparilla, and a table spoonful of the powder of the same, twice a day, with the greatest success, in the most deplorable cases of lues, ill-cured yaws, and carious or ill-disposed sores or cancers.—Wright.