412 APOCYNACE. 
position of the soap, there is left 95:5 per cent. of insoluble 
fatty acids melting at 34°. The elaidin reaction resulted in 
the solidification of the oil in one hour, and after 24 hours it 
became so firm as to hardly yield to the sera of the i 
The ash of the seeds amounts to 8°3 per ce 
Toxicology.—Cases of poisoning with the seeds of Odallam 
are brought to the notice of the medical officer at Trevandrum 
every year ; they act as an irritant poison by producing vomit- 
ing and purging, soon followed by collapse and death. In 
1885, out of four cases, one was fatal; in 1886, seven cases 
were reported. The nut is occasionally eaten by children in 
‘mistake, but it is mostly used intentionally by women who 
wish to commit suicide when they get into trouble. The 
Madras Chemical Examiner in 1888 reported the case of a 
_boy who, after eating the kernel, ‘suffered from vomiting and» 
tingling of the skin and throat, deep sleep, and twitching of 
‘the muscles, and died in 16 hours.” A part of the fruit 
sent with the viscera was identified, 
Pao Pereira.—Under this name the Portuguese in India 
use the intensely bitter bark of ,Geissospermum love, which 
they obtain frem Brazil, as a febrifuge and tonic. 
Santos (1838) separated from it an alkaloid, peretrine, which 
in its impure state, as a brown-yellow amorphous powder, is 
‘employed in Brazil. Bochefontaine and De Freitas (1877) pro- 
posed to call it getssospermine, and Hesse (1877) adopted this 
-name for the alkaloid, which is nearly insoluble in ether and 
water and readily soluble in alcohol and dilute acids; it crys- 
tallizes in small white prisms, dissolves in strong nitric acid 
with a purple-red colour, becoming orange-yellow on heating, 
and in concentrated sulphuric acid at first colourless, rapidly 
changing to blue, and gradually to a pale colour ; its composition 
is C*°H*“N*O?H?0. A second alkaloid, pereirine, is easily 
ible in ether, formsa greyish-white amorphous powder, and 
_ is coloured blood-red by nitric and violet-red by sulphuric acid; 
it appears to be present in larger proportion than the ne pevgeeD : 
one. (Stillé and Maisch.) 
