806 
ed relative to it, to my knowledge, 
when a naturalist gave me half a 
kilo-gramme of the vegetable wax of 
Louisiana. I was curious to make 
a comparative analysis with it and 
bees wax; but before I undertook 
it, I wished to make myself ac- 
quainted with the tree and berry of 
the myrica. I saw.that precious ve- 
getable in the garden of plants, and 
{ wrote to M. Deshayes, a studious 
botanist, who prosecutes the cul- 
ture of the myrica pensylvania, at 
Rambouillet, requesting him to give 
me some details concerning it; he 
had the complaisance to answer me, 
and to send me some of the berries, 
which I immediately examined. 
This berry is about the size of a 
pepper corn; its surface, when ripe 
and fresh, is white, having small 
black asperities, which give it a 
wrinkled appearance: when rubbed 
in the hands, it makes them greasy 
and unctuous. If one of these smal] 
berries is rubbed hard, a matter is 
shelled off apparently of a starchy 
mature, and mixed with small round 
brown grains like fine gun-powder. 
‘The stone, which is left bare, has a 
very thick ligneous shell, and con- 
tains a kernel of the dicotyledon 
kind. By rubbing a handful of the 
berries on a hair sieve, [ have ob- 
tained a grey dust, in which the eye 
can distinguish, without the assist- 
ance of a magnifier, the small brown 
grains above-mentioned, in the 
midst. of a white powder. 
I put this dust. into alcohol, which, 
with a gentle heat, dissolved all the 
white part, and left the black pow- 
der. which I colleéted separate. 
Water poured on this solution with 
alcohol, formed a precipitate, that — 
rose and floated on the surface. I 
melted it, and obtained a yellowish 
wax, similar to that from Louisiana, 
ANNUAL REGISTER,’ 
1803. 
which had been sent me. This ex 
periment is a sufficient proof that 
the wax of the myrice is the white 
gritty matter that envelops the berry. 
The black powder which I had 
Separated, appeared to me to con- 
tain a colouring principle, and I 
was in hopes of discovering in it the - 
beautiful Jake mentioned by M. 
Alexandre. Under this idea, I tri- 
turated this powder, and boiled it 
in a solution of acid sulphat of alu-— 
mine; I was greatly astonished upon 
obtaining a liquor scarcely coloured 
at all, and in which the alumine, 
precipitated by an alkali, was only 
slightly tinged. 
I took another part of this black 
triturated powder, and put it to 
steep in alcohol; I soon obtained a 
dye of the colour of wine lees; I 
‘ 
heated it, and it became as red asa — 
Strong quinguina or cachou liquor. 
This result made me imagine, that 
the colouring principle was resinous ; 
but, upon adding water, I saw no 
signs of a precipitate. 
nk poured into this liquor, weal 
charged with sulphat of alumine; a 
slight precipitation ensued; a solu- 
tion of sulphat of iron instantly 
turned it into ink. 
What then is this colouring as- 
tringent principle, which is soluble 
only in alcohol, is not precipitated 
by water, and has so little attrac- 
tion for alumine? To discover this, 
would require a series of experi- 
ments, which the want of materials 
prevented me from undertaking. 
The astringent matter, noticed by 
M. Alexandre, must exist in the de- 
coétion of the whole berries. Ta 
ascertain this faét, I boiled some 
berries in a silver saucepan; the de- 
coétion,-on-which floated a small 
quantity of wax, was of a greenish 
colour; its taste was slightly astrin- 
gent, 
