_ 
460 . LEG UMIN' OSZE. 
has been drawn to here purgative properties i in the Ph arma- 
copeia of India, and there would.seem to be but little doubt - 
that their action is mild and safe ; they should be administered 
in combination with twice their bulk of acid tartrate of potash 
and a little ginger, and in the same doses. as compound 
jalap powder. The seeds were first brought to England from: 
the island of Ternate; one of the Moluccas, hence the specific 
name of the plant. Haines has: recommended a syrup of the 
deep blue flowers asa seine agent, on a tincture as a 
substitute for litmus, 
Descripti 10n.—The fresh root is white, flesliy: often one 
_inch or more in diameter, but pieces the size of a quill are 
preferred ; it has an acrid taste. The root bark is soft, thick r 
and fibrous and easily separated; the central portion of the _ 
root is ccmposed of very large pitted vessels easily visible to . 
the naked eye. The -seeds are rather more than 2-8ths of an 
inch long and resemble vetch seeds; they are mottled green and — 
black. The testais hard and contains two cotyledons made 
up of elongated thin-walled cells full of large starch granules 5, 
they have an acrid, bitter taste. 
Chemical composition.—Hther dissolves out a yellow resin 
soluble in alcohol and alkaline solutions, and apparently ¢crys~ © 
talline when carefully evaporated. Subsequent treatment of 
the drug with rectified spirit removes an amorphous, reddish- 
brown acid resin and a ‘quantity of alkaline chlorides which — 
leave a deposit of cubical crystals on concentrating the clear 
liquor. This resin forms 4 per cent. of the root: bark. It is 
_ goluble in !alkalies with a red colour, and is reprecipitated by 
acids with discharge of the colour. It forms brown solu- 
tions with concentrated nitric and sulphuric acids. Although 
this resin is not dissolved ont of the drug by ether, 4 
soda solution precipitated by acid and shaken up with ether 
leaves no insoluble residue. The root bark contains.starch, and 
a tannin giving a blue-black precipitate with ferric chloride, 
and yields 12 per cent. of ash. No alkaloid was detected in 
wine the ethereal, sloaholin, or aqueous aatiocie. 
