7S6 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



[March i, i88j. 



Insects most Injueioos to Fakm Okops. — The Royal 

 Agricultural Society of Euglaud has just completed a very 

 important work. Miss B. A. Ormerod, F.M.S., the con- 

 Bultiug entomologist to the society, has prepared a series 

 of six valuable diagrams of the iusects most injurious to 

 farm crops, each forming a large placard 2 feet 6 inches 

 in depth and 1 foot 10 inches wide. The series embrace 

 the most important of our farm insect pests, and are 

 admirably adapted for the purpose for which they ara 

 intended— the giving of proper and trustworthy instruction 

 in elementary schools on this important subject. They 

 are issued to schools by the Koyal Agricultural Society 

 at a very low price. ^Vith these and a copy of Miss 

 Ormerod's " Manual " any teacher could give good and 

 thorough instruction on any of our insect pests. — Ettropean 

 Mail. 



OuPEBA Barks not Oinchona.— Perhaps the most intere.st- 

 ing fact of the year has been the reduction to a certainty 

 of what had before been only a suspicion, that the barks 

 which under the name of "cuprea" have, during the last 

 two or three years, attained such importance as a source 

 of quinine, are not derived from plants belonging to the 

 genus Cinchona. This was hrst announced in a paper 

 published in this Journal in April, the fact having been 

 determined by the celebarated quiuo'ogist. Dr. Triana, as 

 the result of an examination of specimens of the plants 

 yielding the barks received from Oolumbia, which proved 

 to belong to two species of Remijitt. There appear to be 

 at least three different varieties of bark which have beeu 

 imported under the name of "cuprea." But the best known 

 of these, and probably the richest in quinine, is that which 

 was first introduced as coming from Bucaramanga, in the 

 north of Oolumbia; this is said to be derived from plants 

 growing in the mountainous regions of La Paz, which have 

 been referred by Dr. Triana to Remijia Furdieana. Two 

 other varieties derived from plants growing in a district 

 fm-ther south, beyond Bogota,, in the Orinoco basin, have 

 been referred to R. nedunculata. The importance of this 

 determination depends upon the fact that a new series of 

 plants, which are said to be more hardy and easily cult- 

 ivated than cinchonas, have been rendered available as a 

 source of the important febrifugal alkaloids which had been 

 previously supposed to be confined to that genus. Some 

 interesting observations by M. Arnaud show that all these 

 cuprea barks have a greater density than any of the cinchona 

 barks, varying from 1-128 to 1320, whilst the greatest 

 specific gravity noticed in a cinchona bark was r077. 

 According to analyses made by M. Arnaud, the Orinoco 

 cupreas do not as a rule equal Bucaramanga bark in the 

 quantity of quinine they contain ; but all these barks are 

 remarkable for the proportion of quinidine present, and 

 the absence of cinchonidine. Amongst the bark from 

 Bucaramanga a very dense variety is sometimes met with, 

 which is nevertheless considered by Dr. Triana to be the 

 product of the same species growing under different con- 

 ditions. It is noteworthy, however, that it is from this 

 variety that M. Arnaud claims to have separated a peculiar 

 alkaloid which he has described under the name of cinchona- 

 muie. It may bo here mentioned that the alkaloid, which 

 under the names of "homoquinine" and "mltraquiniue" was 

 described simultaneously by three sets of observers at the 

 close of last year, has been the subject of an investigation by 

 Dr. Hesse, who has described its physical properties more 

 minutely and attributed to it the formula, when dried at 120° 

 0. of Ol9Ha2N202. The netural sulphate is described a- 

 crystallizing with six molecules of water in short prisms. As 

 homoquinine sulphate resembles quinine sulphate in its spars 

 ing solubility in water. Dr. Hes,se thinks it is probably 

 frequently present in the commercial salt : but "homoquiuine" 

 is markedly distinguishad from quinine by its sparing 

 solubility in ether. Herr Korner has made the curious 

 observation that dm-ing the manufacture of sulphate of 

 quinine from cuprea bark a notable quantity of caffeic acid 

 is formed, evidently as the product of the breaking 

 up of a complex substance existing in the bark together 

 with the alkaloid, and this is found in the mother-liquor 

 in the state of caffeate of quinine. The genera Cinchona 

 and Cnffta both belong to the same natural order, al- 

 though not to the same tribe, and this chemical confirm- 

 ation of botanical relationship has its counterpart in a pre- 

 vious observation of quinic acid in the coffee plant — 

 i'lMiinaceiUical Juwiiml. 



Soap-Bark Trees. — The soap-bark tree of Ohili is on 

 trial at San Francisco, Oal., and so far promises well. The 

 imported bark is preferred to ordinary soap by the Mexican 

 population, and in woollen mills on account of its sujierior 

 cleansing properties. — Chicago Lumhennan. 



Cultivation of the Divi-divi. — Mr. John Oox, writes 

 from Nagercoil : — I bought a few seeds of Divi-divi from 

 the garden of a gentleman in Trevaudrum some five years 

 ago, where the plant was growing aud bearing seed well 

 and I put the seeds near my bungalow, at an elevation 

 of 2,500 above the sea. They came up, and the plants 

 are growing, and seem hardy, but they have not shown 

 any signs of blossom. One plant is about twelve feet 

 high, with spreading branches ; it is growing in the or- 

 dinary soil of the grassy hills here, about twenty miles 

 from the sea, not far from the southern end of the 

 Western Ghauts. It is not much affected by the strong 

 winds which we sometimes experience. I see it stated 

 in Drury's Useful Plants that this beautiful tree was in- 

 troduced into India by Dr. Wallich, 25 years ago; that 

 was written in 1858 ; also " that it, is properly a native 

 of the sea-shore of St. Domingo and of Ouraccoa. " 

 — JIadrat Mail. 



The Herbarium (of the Pharmaceutical Society had 

 been increased by a valuable series of medicinal plants from 

 the Botanical Gardens at Ceylon; also by an excellent set 

 of specimens of various species of aconite and by speci- 

 mens of the plants yielding damiana aud Japanese oil of 

 peppermint. The collection of materia medica has been 

 enriched by numerous contributions, notably by specimens 

 of new alkaloids from Messrs. Merck, by a tolerably com- 

 plete series of the cuprea harks from various donors, by 

 a number of Madagascar drugs collected by Dr. G. W. 

 Parker, the Physician to the Queen of that island, and by 

 the scarce and not easily obtainable Dyak poison of Borneo. 

 The catalogue of the Hanbury Collection has beeu prepared 

 for the press, and has now only to be enriched by additional 

 notes from the private Mss. of the late Mr. Daniel Hanbury 

 before being published. The number of visitors to the 

 Museum has shown a small increase, and many duplicate 

 specimens have been distributed to local associations or lent 

 for scientific purposes. — PharmaceuticalJoiirnal . 



Quinine and Alkaloids.— Besides the investigation in 

 respect to homoquinine, before referred to, Dr. Hesse has 

 given further information respecting some of the more un- 

 common cinchona alkaloids, and has described a new one, 

 which is liquid, volatile and odorous, and which he thinks 

 may possibly play some part in the formation of quinine; 

 this he has named " cincholine." Dr. de Vrij has defended 

 from attack his process for the quantitative estimation of 

 quinine by means of iodosulphate of quinoidine, and has 

 brou-jht forward strong evidence to show that the herapathite 

 formed under the conditions laid down is very constant in 

 composition. He has also described a modification of 

 ProUius's process for the estimation of the total alkaloids 

 of cinchona bark, in which a mixture of ether, spirit and 

 ammonia is used to extract the bark. In a paper read by 

 Mr. Giles before the British Pharmaceutical Conference, 

 another process for the estimation of the total alkaloids, 

 recommended by Dr, de Vrij, was described, in which the 

 bark is exhausted with dilute hydrochloric acid. In the same 

 paper Mr. Giles put forward a plea for a return to the 

 use of pharmaceutical preparations of the bark. Quinine 

 iodate and bromate have been recommended for therapeutic 

 use by Dr. Cameron, and some attention has been paid to 

 the preparation of a "tasteless" tannate. Among the 

 substitutes for quinine, chinoline continues to hold a place, 

 as well as its tartrate and salicylate ; but early in the year 

 Mr. Ekin g.-ive some reasons that the substance supplied at 

 that time as "pm-e chinoline" was mjre or less a iiiixture 

 of homologous bodies. Being sceptical as to chinoline re- 

 presenting all the characteristic properties of quinine, Messrs. 

 Fischer and Konigs prepared for physiological experiment 

 a number of compounds by the introduction of various 

 hydroxyl and other groups into the chinoline molecule. It 

 was found that the antipyretic property is possessed to the 

 greatest degree by compounds in which the nitrogeiiatom 

 is joineil witli two atoms of carbon in the chinoline ring 

 and an atom of carbon in a methyl or other alcohol group. 

 This occurs in three known compounds, but the most con- 

 venient for prepai-ation is oxychinolinmethylhydried, which 

 has beeu named more brielly "kaii'iue."— /7«(M(»««tTirfiVai 

 Journal. 



