CHEMISTRY. 417 



tion. It crystallizes ia short, thick prismatic forms, which are not well 

 developed. Alcohol and ether dissolve it very easily. It fuses at 220° 

 (uucorr.), but undergoes at the same time partial decomposition. It 

 possesses a very marked sweet taste, being much siveeter than cane sugar. 

 The taste is perfectly pure. The miuutest quantity of the substance, if 

 placed upon the tip of the tongue, causes a sensation of pleasant sweet- 

 ness throughout the entire cavity of the mouth. As stated above, the 

 substance is soluble only to a slight extent in cold water, but if a few 

 drops of the cold aqueous solution be placed in an ordinary goblet full 

 of water, the latter then tastes like the sweetest sirup. Its presence 

 can hence easily be detected in the dilutest solutions by the taste. 

 Orthouitrobenzoic acid has this same property, but the sweetness is by 

 no means so intense as in the case of benzoic suli)hinide." (Am. Chem. 

 J., I, 430.) 



On the 2d of February, 1880, Dr. Ivan Lewinstein read a paper before 

 the Society of Chemical Industry on " Saccharine," in which he gives 

 sole credit of the discovery of this sweet substance to Dr. Remsen's 

 assistant. The process of preparing it is the same, though he prefers 

 for it the name benzoyl-sulphonicimide, or the trade-name "saccharine." 

 The constitution of this body is thus shown : 



/CO\ 



Dr. Lewinstein gives the following account of the properties and pros- 

 pective uses of this substance: 



Saccharine presents the appearance of a white powder, and crystal- 

 lizes from its aqueous solution iu thick short prisms, which are with 

 difficulty soluble in cold water, but more easily in warm. Alcohol, 

 ether, glucose, glycerole, etc., are good solvents of saccharine. It melts 

 at 200° C, with partial decomposition; its taste in diluted solutions is 

 intensely sweet, so mush so that one part will give a very sweet taste 

 to 10,000 parts of water. Saccharine forms salts, all of which possess 

 a powerful saccharine taste; it is endowed with moderately strong an- 

 tiseptic properties, and is not decomposed in the human system, but 

 eliminated from the body without undergoing any change. It is about 

 two hundred and thirty times sweeter than the best cane or beetroot 

 sugar. According to Dr. Stutzser, of Bonn, who has carefully inves- 

 tigated the physiological properties of this substance, saccharine, taken 

 into the stomach in the quantities in which it has to be added to food 

 ^s a sweetening material, has no injurious effect whatever on the human 

 system. Stutzser has given to dogs about 5 grams a day, without ob- 

 serving any ill effects in them, and when we consider that 5 grams are 

 equal in sweetening power to rather more than 2;^ pounds of sugar, a 

 quantity far larger than any one would like to consume in a day, his 

 view seems amply corroborated by this fact alone; but, in addition to 

 this, patients suffering from diabetes have now been treated for several 

 montlis in one of the [irincipal hospitals in Berlin, as I am informed, 

 without their feeling the least inconvenience by its use. Pliysjeimis 

 must be glad to find in saccharine a s'-ibstauce. by means of which «ii- 

 H. Mis. 600 27 



