so M. Simon 07i Jervine, a new Vegetable Base, 



The expressed liquid contains both bases, namely, the new 

 one and veratria. In order to separate the one from the 

 other, the liquid was evaporated to dryness, and the residuum 

 ' boiled with diluted sulphuric acid. The new base forms with 

 sulphuric acid a salt of very difficult solution, which on cooling 

 is precipitated, while the sulphate of veratria remains dis- 

 solved. The treatment with sulphuric acid is again repeated 

 with the residuum. This combination of the new base with 

 sulphuric acid, so difficult of solution, is decomposed by boiling 

 it with a solution of the carbonate of soda. 



The most suitable name for the new base would perhaps be 

 veratria, if we might give to what has hitherto been called 

 veratria the name of sabadilline, from its occurring in the seeds 

 of sabadilla, which contain none of the new base. But the 

 name veratria is so generally received for the base from saba- 

 dilla seed, that it would be wrong to change it. We could not 

 well term the new base helleborine, since by this means the 

 confusion which already prevails between hellebore and Ve~ 

 ra/rum might be further increased, and it is also possible that 

 a peculiar base may be discovered in some species of helle- 

 bore. I have given to the new substance the name of Jervine, 

 because Caspar Bauhin, in his Pinax Theatri Botanici, p. 186, 

 states, that the Spaniards call the poison from the Hellehorus 

 albus de Balastera, or de Jerva, 



Jervine has some very peculiar properties. The most re- 

 markable is, that it forms combinations with sulphuric acid, 

 nitric acid, and muriatic acid, which are not very easily dis- 

 solved in water. Of these the combination with sulphuric 

 acid is the most difficult of solution. By an excess of acids 

 these salts do not become much more soluble. If, however, 

 the combination with sulphuric acid be boiled with much water, 

 it is dissolved ; on cooling it again separates itself. The acetic 

 and phosphoric acids form with this base combinations easily 

 soluble in water. The base is precipitated from these solu- 

 tions by the addition of the three above-mentioned mineral 

 acids. By alcohol, the salts of the base which are difficult 

 of solution, are rendered soluble ; the solubility, however, in 

 alcohol is not so great as in the salts of the other organic 

 bases. It has previously been mentioned, that the combina- 

 tions of the base which are hard to be dissolved, for instance 

 those with sulphuric acid, are decomposed by boiling them with 

 alkaline carbonates. 



[M- Simon is evidently unacquainted with the sabadilline described by 

 M. Couerbe, in Ann. de Chim. el dc Phys., vol. lii., p. t37fi ; a substance 

 closely allied to that v hich he has noticed, if not identical with it — Edit.] 



