164 Professor Apjohn on a new Compound. 



From these facts it seems legitimate to infer that it is the oil, and not any 

 modification of it corresponding to the benzoyle of chemists, which is associated 

 with the iodine and iodide of potassium, and that they are all held together by an 

 extremely feeble affinity ; inasmuch as not only is the iodide of potassium sepa- 

 rated by water, as has been stated, but the iodine is affected by a solution of 

 potash just as if it were free. To test the truth of this opinion, a little of the 

 compound was decomposed in a small glass retort by the exact equivalent of a 

 very dilute caustic alkali, and, a receiver being applied, about half an ounce of 

 a liquid, having the appearance and obvious properties of cinnamon water, was 

 drawn off by distillation. From it, however, I could not, though every precau- 

 tion was employed, procure a particle of the original crystalline compound. The 

 properties indeed of the distilled liquid were not, upon an accurate examination, 

 identical with those of cinnamon water. Its odour, for example, was slightly 

 different, and it reddened litmus, — a circumstance from which it may be inferred 

 to contain cinnamic acid. It is therefore not unlikely that the oil may have 

 absorbed oxygen, or have been otherwise altered, during the distillation ; and as 

 a confirmation of this opinion, I may mention that the oil of cassia which is 

 found in the market abounds in cinnamic acid, and that a cinnamon water pre- 

 pared from it by a process directed in some of the pharmacopoeiae yields but a 

 very minute proportion of the substance which is the subject of the present 

 paper. 



With a view to the analysis of this compound, the first point to determine 

 was the proportion of iodide of potassium which it included. To accomplish 

 this, a known weight of it was heated in a small porcelain capsule, by which 

 iodine and oil of cinnamon were expelled in the vaporous state, and there re- 

 mained a mixture of iodide of potassium with a little carbon, resulting from the 

 decomposition of a portion of the oil. The iodide of potassium was separated 

 from the carbon by solution in water, and the use of a single filter, which had 

 been previously deprived of all soluble matter by the action, first, of a dilute 

 acid, and subsequently of distilled water. The filter being well washed, the 

 solution was evaporated to dryness in a carefully counterpoised capsule, and then 

 accurately weighed. The following are the results of three experiments thus 

 conducted : 



