Dangerous Garden by David Stuart, Frances Lincoln, 拢25, ISBN 0711222657 Reviewed by Roy Herbert
IT IS salutary to be reminded that until the dawn of the 20th century, just about the only medicines available to treat disease or cure wounds, calm passions or excite them, were extracted from plants. For thousands of years before then, the hit or miss system of trying the effects of such potions had results that couldn鈥檛 be predicted.
Plants could kill or cure or, usually, do neither. Even today the most popular and valuable drug, with possibly undiscovered potential, is just one step away from a plant product: it is aspirin.
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This history is a rich field for gardener and botanist David Stuart to tackle, and he is in cracking form. Here are wars, plagues, poisoners, poetry, moral campaigns, gourmets, explorers, charlatans, aphrodisiacs, gods, alcoholism, degradation, exploitation, epidemics, towering personalities, desperadoes and agony, to name a few. All this could hardly fail to be fascinating. A rare, absorbing book with the bonus of sumptuous illustration. A pleasure from first to last.