A GREEN DYE FROM CHINA. 125 



of it. The experiments of Dr. Van Bemmelen leave little 1856 - 

 ground for placing any reliance on the reputed good effects of 

 the drug so applied ; and I fully concur in that writer's con- 

 clusions as expressed in terms which I translate thus : 



" I therefore believe myself justified in the opinion that it is 

 highly improbable that that which water extracts from this plant 

 is an active remedy for internal hemorrhages. There appears to 

 me no ground whatever, eith'er from a chemical or physiological 

 point of view, for presuming that we may expect any good re- 

 sult in practice from the employment of such a preparation." 



NOTE UPON A GREEN DYE FROM CHINA. 



(Gfiiiner Farbstoff aus China.) 



SOME weeks since a merchant showed me a small sample of a isse. 

 new dye, said to have been imported into Marseilles from China, 

 and to be recommended for dyeing silk. From its dark blue 

 colour I conjectured it might be a sort of indigo, such as the 

 Chinese are stated to prepare from Isatis tinctoria, L., and from 

 Polygonum tinctorium, Lour., but I had no opportunity of deter- 

 mining whether it was indigo, by any chemical examination. 



Very recently, however, a larger sample of the same dye and 

 a piece of cotton cloth dyed green with it, have been sent to 

 me by my friend William Lockhart, Esq., of Shanghai. They 

 were accompanied by a communication as to the manufacture 

 of the dye upon the authority of the Eev. J. Edkins, the sub- 

 stance of which is given below. 



I may add that Mr. Lockhart forwarded to me in the early 

 part of this year stems of the cultivated tree called Luh-chac, 

 being one of those from whose bark the dye is manufactured, 

 but no specimens from which its botanical characters could be 

 ascertained. 



The dye, which is known as a green dye, and called Ltih-kaou, The Dye 

 consists of a dry paste, in small irregular fragments scarcely M " aou ' 

 thicker than stout paper. Its colour is an intense blue-black, 

 with a little of the coppery lustre seen upon indigo. Rubbed 

 upon paper with a moistened ivory knife, it develops a greenish- 



