THE ALUNI JOURNAL. 



217 



A COLLEGE OF PHARHACY BUILDING 

 IN SAN FRANCISCO. 



Our friends upon the Pacific coast are 

 to be congratulated upon their success in 

 converting their relations as a department of 

 the State University into something more tangi- 

 ble than that which obtains on this side of the 

 continent. Like us, they have for a long time 

 been associated with the State institution in 

 name only, the net outcome of the relation, so 

 far as the public good was concerned, consist- 

 ing in a presentation to the Regents of an an- 

 nual report of progress, which, of course, would 

 have been published with equal promptitude and 

 usefulness if the State University had not ex- 

 isted. In other words, the "State University " 

 under such conditions is practically a myth. 

 During the past year, however, the State Uni- 

 versity of California has succeed in obtaining 

 from the State an appropriation of some three- 

 quarters of a million, to be applied to the pur- 

 poses of the departments of law, medicine, 

 pharmacy, and, if we recollect rightly, veter- 

 inary science. In addition to this large sum of 

 money to be devoted to building purposes, it is 

 understood that the site for the buildings is to 

 be obtained through donations. An entire block 

 is to be devoted to this purpose. 



It is, of course, in the pharmaceutical depart- 

 ment that we are more especially interested. 

 With admirable wisdom the promoters of the 

 enterprise determined to secure the very best 

 data obtainable before proceeding to execute 

 the task imposed upon them, and a commission 

 was appointed, representing all the four de- 

 partments interested, for the purpose of visiting 

 similar institutions throughout the country. 

 Upon the 25th inst, this commission visited our 

 college and devoted several hours to a minute 

 examination of the building, both from an 

 architectural and an educational standpoint, 

 and carefully investigated at the same time the 

 methods of instruction here employed. As the 

 college received notice of the intended visit no 

 earlier than the preceding Saturday afternoon, 

 it resulted that we could not show to our visit- 

 ors the aitention that we desired. Nevertheless 

 they were conducted through the building by 

 several members of the faculty as well as by 

 the clerk and by Mr. Mason. We understand 

 that they expressed themselves as highly pleased 

 both with the institution and with the methods 

 of instruction, which they regarded as being the 

 most complete and practical which had been 

 anywhere observed. 



NATURE OF THE VESICATING CONSTI- 

 TUENT OF CROTON OIL.* 



The vesicating constituent, or more 

 strictly, the postule-producing constitu- 

 ent of croton oil, has been the subject of 

 investigation by numerous chemists and 

 pharmacologists during the past forty 

 years. According to the researches i f 

 Bucheim, and more recently of Kobert 

 and Hirschheydt, the vesicating action is 

 due to an acid closely allied to oleic acid, 

 which has been given the name of cro- 

 tonoleic acid. This substance is now 

 prepared on a large scale in Germany for 

 medical use, being extracted from croton 

 oil by the method devised by Kobert and 

 Hirschheydt. This consists in saponify- 

 ing with barium hydroxide that part of 

 croton oil which readily dissolves in 

 strong alcohol. The resulting barium 

 salts are washed with water, then dried 

 and repeatedly extracted with ether, 

 which dissolves the barium salts of oelic 

 and crotonoleic acids. These salts are 

 separated by means of ether, which dis- 

 solves only the barium crotonoleate, and 

 this, when decomposed with dilute sul- 

 phuric acid and extracted with ether, 

 furnishes the crotonoleic acid as a viscid 

 oil. 



Since very little is known about this 

 acid, even its composition, being unde- 

 termined, the authors prepared it with 

 the object of studying its properties, and, 

 if possible, of determining the constitu- 

 tion, since no fatty acid of known con- 

 stitution exhibits the property of vesicat- 

 ing. Starting with the crotonoleic acid, 

 prepared as described above, the lead 

 salt was obtained and submitted to a pro- 

 cess of fractional precipitation by adding 

 successive quantities of water to its solu- 

 tion in alcohol. By this means croton- 

 oleic acid was proved to be a mixture 

 composed for the most part of inactive 

 oily acids, the lead salts of which are 

 precipitated first, while the true vesicat- 



