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1014 
obtained which rapidly changes to orange-red. Ditamine with Froehdes’s reagent 
gives a fine, indigo-blue color, which rapidly passes into a green, With concen- 
trated sulphurie acid, to which a little cane sugar has been added, the alkaloid 
gives a red color; however, this reaction is not sensitive; the color could not be 
distinguished from that obtained with concentrated sulphuric acid alone. 
The taste of the free alkaloid is pleasantly bitter, that of the salts exceedingly 
so. The alcoholic solution turns red litmus paper to a blue color, and the alkaloid 
is freely soluble in acidulated water; when such a solution is rendered alkaline, 
ditamine separates in white flocks. The alkaloid has an odor which reminds one 
very much of dimethyl] aniline; this is especially true if it is freshly prepared and 
damp or if it still contains a little alkali. The odor is probably due to a slight 
decomposition, and it is of interest in view of the fact that Harnack * claimed that 
his detain was decomposed by boiling with concentrated hydrochloric acid into 
glucose and the hydrochloride of an oil which he suspected to be dimethyl aniline. 
Hesse prepared the hydrochloride of this alkaloid, but was not able to study it 
because of scanty material. The solution of ditamine hydrochloride gives precipi- 
tates with phospho-molybdie acid, with iodine-potassium iodide solution, and with 
tannin; it is not changed by ferric chloride. A small amount, heated in a test 
tube with solid, powdered potassium hydrate, gave the dimethyl aniline odor 
referred to above. 
I have not been able to obtain a sufficient amount of ditamine for 
detailed study from the material thus far worked up. In the future 
work an exhaustive attempt will be made to settle the question as to the 
amount of this alkaloid present in dita bark. 
Echitamine.—Kchitamine or, as Hesse prefers to call it, echitam- 
monium hydroxide, is obtained as a brown, varnish-like mass on evaporat- 
ing the chloroform solution obtained by shaking out the strongly alkaline 
solution, as was mentioned in the method of preparation outlined above. 
The hydrochloride can readily be isolated from the crude alkaloid thus 
obtained, and from this salt it is easy to separate the free alkaloid. To 
this end the salt is dissolved in water, the solution rendered strongly 
alkaline with sodium hydrate and then shaken out with chloroform. If 
the chloroform is allowed slowly to evaporate in the cold storage, crystals 
of the free alkaloid are obtained in the form of prisms, but if the 
solvent is evaporated rapidly, echitamine usually separates in an amor- 
phous condition. It is also possible to obtain the alkaloid crystalline from 
its solution in strong alcohol or in equal parts of water and acetone. 
The free base is rather easily soluble in water; this aqueous solution 
turns litmus paper blue and has an exceedingly bitter taste. The alkaloid 
dissolves in both hot and cold alcohol; it is insoluble in cold acetone, but 
more soluble in hot. It is freely taken up by chloroform, but only with 
difficulty by petroleum ether. Freshly precipitated echitamine dissolves 
in ether, but the crystals are insoluble in this medium. 
*® Loc. cit. 
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