Cinchona another fever remedy. The bark of cinchona can be harvested in a number of ways. One approach was to cut the tree but this and girdling are equally destructive and unsustainable so small strips were cut and various techniques such as "mossing", the application of moss to the cut areas, were used to allow the tree to heal. Other approaches involved coppicing and chopping of side branches which were then stripped of bark. The bark was dried into what were called quills and then powdered for medicinal uses. The bark contains alkaloids, including quinine and quinidine. Cinchona is the only
Cinchona mention of the Countess suffering from fever although the Count himself had many malarial attacks. On account of numerous other discrepancies this is best treated as a legend. Quina bark was mentioned by Fray Antonio de La Calancha in 1638 as coming from a tree in Loja (Loxa). He noted that bark powder weighing about two coins was cast into water and drunk to cure fevers and "tertians". Jesuit Father Bernabé Cobo (1582–1657) also wrote on the "fever tree" in 1653. The legend was popularized in English literature by Markham in his writings and in 1874 he also published a