Drs. Muspratt and Hofmann on Toluidine. 181 



produced if we only succeed in obtaining the appropriate 

 car bo-hydrogen. 



A greater correspondence as to properties and chemical 

 character cannot be imagined than that subsisting between 

 aniline and the two following bases : nicotine contained in the 

 fresh leaves of the tobacco plant, and coiiiine found by Geiger 

 in all parts of the hemlock [Conitim maadatuiri). 



According to the analysis of Ortigosa and Belard, lately 

 corrected by Melsens*, nicotine is represented by the formula 



and coniine, by Ortigosa'sf formula, which has yet to be 



confirmed, by C,,U,,^ Q). 



Now if we could succeed in obtaining the carbo-hydrogens 



there would be no difficulty in procuring, in an artificial way, 

 nicotine and coniine, i. e, by treating the product of the ac- 

 tion of fuming nitric acid upon the above hydrocarbons with 

 sulphuret of ammonium. We should have — 

 Cjo Hg unknown. 



Cjg Hjg unknown. 

 CiefS;^!^ unknown. 





The hypothetical hydro-carbons above cited havenot hitherto 

 been obtained ; but when we consider how many decomposi- 

 tions yield carbo-hydrogens, and also that the destructive di- 

 stillation of organic matters promises to furnish us with an 

 inexhaustible supply of these compounds ; and as we recog- 

 nise daily, produced in these processes of transformation, new 

 bodies thoroughly analogous to those looked for, we need not 

 despair of obtaining those sought; and thus, by the destruc- 

 tion of organic compounds, open a new source for the forma- 

 tion of products generated in other ways, and which are pro- 

 duced in the vegetation of plants. 



Considerations such as these have led us to undertake 



* Ami. del' Chem. und Pharm., vol. xlix. p. 353. 

 f Ibid. vol. xlii. p. 313. 



