PASSIFLOREH. BS 
The odour and flavour of the fresh juice recalled that of petro- 
_leum or of vulcanised india-rubber- e microscope showed 
it to be a fine grumous mass containing some larger particles 
and isolated starch grains. Jodine coloured the juice yellowish 
_ brown. A portion of the juice was dissolved in three times its 
weight of water, and, this was placed with 10 grammes of 
quite fresh lean beef in one piece in distilled water, and boiled 
for five minutes. Below the boiling point the meat fell into 
Several pieces, and at the close of the experiment it had sepa- 
rated into coarse shreds. In the control experiments made 
without the juice the boiled meat was visibly harder. Hard 
boiled albumen, digested with a little juice at a temperature of 
20° C., could after twenty-four hours be easily broken up with 
_ aglassrod. 50 grammes of beef in one piece, enveloped in a 
leaf of C. papaya during 24 hours at 15° C., after a short boil- 
4 ing became perfectly tender; a similar piece wrapped in paper 
and heated in the same manner remained quite hard. Some 
comparative experiments were also made with pepsin, and the 
following are the conclusions arrived at by the author :— 
(1) The milky juice of the Carica papaya is (or contains) 
a ferment which has an extraordinarily energetic action upon 
nitrogenous substances, and like pepsin curdles milk ; (2) this 
juice differs from pepsin in being active without the addition 
of free acid, probably it contains a small quantity, and further 
_ it operates ata higher temperature (about 60° to 65° C. ) and in 
_ ashorter time (5 minutes at most); (8) the filtered j juice differs 
_ chemically from pepsin in that it gives no precipitate on boiling, 
_ and further that it is precipitated by mercuric chloride, iodine, 
and oll the mineral acids; (4) it resembles pepsin in being 
: precipitated by neutral whales of lead, and not giving a pre- 
_ cipitate with sulphate of copper and perchloride of iron. Sf ot: = 
4 Jour., Nov. 30, 1878. ) ee 
_ ‘The active principle has since been separated and given the — 
a name of Papain ; it is now an article of commerce in 
_ for medicinal purposes, and is said to be capable of d 
q 200 times its weight of Aibrin ; it has been used as a 
diphtheritic false ‘ and a 
| eet Paced ee 
