in an excellent manner), the only chemical investigation 
that had been done on the active principles of the seeds 
of iivea corymbosa before the studies carried out by us, 
is discussed. It was carried out by the pharmacologist, 
C. G. Santesson, in Stockholm in 1937.° He was, how- 
ever, unsuccesful in isolating defined, crystallized com- 
pounds. Certain reactions seemed to suggest the pres- 
ence of gluco-alkaloids. 
Following Schultes’ work, only two original publica- 
tions have appeared that deal with the psychic action of 
ololiuhqui seeds on volunteers. In 1955, a Canadian psy- 
chiatrist, H. Osmond, conducted a series of experiments 
on himself. After taking 60 to 100 Rivea seeds, he passed 
into a state of apathy and listlessness accompanied by in- 
creased visual sensitivity. After about four hours, there 
followed a period in which he had a relaxed feeling of 
well-being, a feeling that lasted for some time.” In con- 
trast to this result, V.J. Kinross-W right in 1958 published 
the results of experiments performed on eight male volun- 
teers who had taken doses of up to 125 seeds administered 
without any ascertainable effect in a single case." 
Isolation and chemical identification of the active 
alkaloidal principles 
Plate XXXVI shows the seeds of Rivea corymbosa 
(L.) Hall.f. and of Ipomoea violacea L., the origin of 
which has been given above and which were used for the 
chemical investigations now described. Plate XX XV 
shows plants in bloom that were cultivated from these 
seeas. 
We started our extraction studies with Rivea corym- 
bosa. Since we knew nothing of the chemical nature and 
sensitivity of the active principles, only neutral solvents 
were used and all extracts were evaporated carefully at 
low temperature. The finely powdered seeds were ex- 
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