354 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OP [1886. 



logwood bark and Saraca Indica bark, the powdered material 

 was macerated over the water-bath with distilled or filtered river 

 water acidulated with dilute sulphuric acid (1 part to 50), the ex- 

 tract was filtered and the process repeated until no more color 

 was removed. This extract was treated directly with the reagents. 

 Excess of reagents produced darker tints, and after a time the 

 solutions were decolorized. 



Keagents. 



Hccmatoxylon Campechianum. \ ^^ 



Saraca Indica. 

 yxylon Campechi 



Acidified Extract. 



Sodium Carbonate. 

 Sodium Hydrate. 

 Potassium Hydrate. 

 Ammonia. 



Pale purple to reddish violet sol. 

 Blue violet ppt. and sol. 

 Red-colored solution. 

 Pinkish-purple solution. 



Among other constituents contained in the Saraca bark, catechin 

 and saponin were determined. Their presence along with haema- 

 toxylin is significant as showing the chemical position of Saraca 

 in relation to the genera Acacia and Hsematoxylort ; catechin and 

 saponin being found, as is well known, in Acacia. The evolutionary 

 position of the order Leguminosae, to which these genera belong, 

 was pointed out in a former paper ,^ and it was stated that all 

 orders containing saponin came under the middle division of M. 

 Heckel's botanical scheme,^ or multiplicity of floral elements. 

 The facts accumulated from recent researches, since the publica- 

 tion of her article in the Botanical Gazette, and the discovery 

 of saponin in many plants of widely diflferent genera and families, 

 seem to justify and confirm what was stated in the article 

 referred to above, " saponin is invariably absent where the floral 

 elements are simple ; it is invariably absent where the floral 

 elements are condensed to their greatest extent. Its position is 

 plainly that of a factor in the great middle realm of plant life 

 when the elements of the individual are striving to condense, and 

 thus increase their physiological action and the economy of parts. '"^ 



George McClellan, M. D., and George L. English were elected 

 members. 



Prof. E. Selenka was elected a correspondent. 

 The following was ordered to be printed : 



' Certain chemical constituents of plants considered in relation to their 

 morphology and evolution, by H. C. De S. Abbott. Botanical Gazette, 

 vol. xi, 1886, p. 270. 



* Les plantes et latheoriede revolution, Revue Scieniifique, 13 Mars, 1886. 



^ Loc cit. Botanical Gazette. 



