RANUNCULACES. | 17 
_ brown tabular cells; the brown zone seen in Aconite is not 
_ present. 
: Chemical composition.—The authors of the Pharmacographia, 
_ upon the authority of Broughton, state that the root contains 
_ a well-defined alkaloid of intensely bitter taste, Formula C*® — 
_ H’?* N? O° obtained from concurrent analyses of a platinum 
_ salt. Wright (1878) percolated the powdered dry root with 
_ alcohol containing a little tartaric acid, and evaporating the 
_ percolate he obtained ultimately Broughton’s alkaloid atisine. 
_ This was uncrystallizable, but with hydrochloric acid and gold 
chloride, he obtained a crystalline hydrodichloride, 0?* H** 
- NO? HCl, AuCl’, from which he suggests that C?? H* NO? 
may prove nearer the correct formula for atisine than that given 
by Broughton. Atis has recently (1879) been examined 
chemically by Wasowicz. The general results of his investi- 
gation are: that he found the root to contain—/(1) a fat of 
‘soft consistence, probably a mixture of oleic, palmitic, and 
earic glycerides; (2) aconitic acid; (3) an acid related to 
ordinary tannic acid; (4) cane-sugar; (5) vegetable mucilage; 
(6) pectous substances ; (7) atisine, the alkaloid already 
_ observed by Broughton, and probably another uncrystallizable 
alkaloid; (8) starch. The root contained 2°331 per cent. of ash 
that dissolved partly in water and partially in dilute hydro- 
_chloric acid. Experiments made in administering the alkaloid 
_ to rabbits show that it is not poisonous. The quantity in the 
_ root is exceedingly small (,§, of 1 per cent.). The purified 
alkaloid is white and uncrystallizable; of its salts, only 
_ the hydrochlorate, hydrobromate and hydriodate are crystal- — 
_lizable. (Archiv. der Pharmacie, Vol. XI., p. 19.) Atisine when 
_ dissolved in sulphuric acid gives a purple colour, a reaction which 
_ has been observed by E. Z. Gross with coptine obtained from 
_ Coptis trifoliata; and with hydrastine, one of the alkaloids 
_of Hydrastis canadensis, plants belonging to the same natural — 
order. | 
_ Commerce.—Atis comes into the plains through the princif 
_ towns of Northern India ; it would appear that i in some VAI 
