THE SUPRARENAL CAPSULES. 



467 



jecorin, first separated by Drechsel * from the liver. The 

 actual method of isolation is too technical to be given here, 

 but Manasse used practically the same process with the 

 suprarenal. Baldi 2 has also separated jecorin not only from 

 the liver but from the spleen, which next to the liver gives 

 the highest yield, brain, and muscle. Jecorin resembles 

 lecithin in many of its properties and seems to accompany 

 lecithin pretty constantly (Baldi). The resemblance to 

 lecithin noted by Drechsel is accentuated by the fact dis- 

 covered by Manasse, that it yields choline, glycero-phos- 

 phoric acid, and fatty acids on decomposition. The car- 

 bohydrate obtainable from it, and to which it owes its 

 reducing properties, appears by its characters to be most 

 like dextrose. The power which jecorin possesses of re- 

 ducing Fehling's solution seems to vary with the source from 

 which it is derived (Baldi). 



The substance obtained from the suprarenals, however, 

 is not jecorin, though it has a general resemblance to it. 

 The two bodies differ in some of their solubilities, and in 

 the fact that the new substance does not reduce Fehling's 

 solution until after prolonged boiling, with sulphuric acid ; 

 the sugar then formed appears to be dextrose. If one next 

 compares the percentage composition of the two substances 

 the difference is seen to be very marked, especially in the 

 amount of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus. This is shown 

 in the following table. 



1 Jour?i. prakt. C/iem., xxxiii., 425. 



2 £>u Bois-Reymond's Archiv, 1887, Suppl. No., p. 100. 



33 



