276 CHINESE SAL AMMONIAC. 



1865. 



NOTE ON CHINESE SAL AMMONIAC. 



(Chinesischer Salmiak.) 



AMONG a numerous collection of Chinese drags, a report upon 

 which I published in the Pharmaceutical Journal in the years 

 1860-61, and 62, was a substance called Naou-sha, which par- 

 ticularly excited my curiosity, on account of the enormous price 

 at which it is valued by the Chinese, and the remarkable 

 virtues ascribed to it. But as is the case with many similar 

 substances (of which we are not without parallels in European 

 medicine) the value of this drug proved to be due, not to its 

 peculiar properties, so much as to the superstition and ignorance 

 of those who sell or administer it. 



The first sample I received was accompanied with the inquiry 

 if it were not iodide of potassium, and had it been that sub- 

 stance one could hardly be surprised that even twenty dollars an 

 ounce might be paid for it. It was a rounded fragment of a 

 substance of dark colour and compact crystalline structure, 

 which chemical examination proves to be chloride of sodium. 

 Since his return from China, my friend Mr. Lockhart has kindly 

 placed in my hands a more ample supply of this substance, the 

 examination f which has shown that though essentially chloride 

 of sodium, it contains traces of alkaline sulphuret, and that it 

 resembles an composition and general appearance one of the 

 forms of impure chloride of sodium found in the bazaars of 

 Indian Black India under the name of Black Salt. 



Tatarinov, in his Catalogue of Chinese Medicines* represents 

 the name Naou-sha to be applied to sal ammoniac of volcanic 

 origin, and in Pekin. at least such is truly the case. When my 

 friend Mr. Lockhart was residing in that capital in charge of 

 the hospital established under the auspices of the London 

 Missionary Society, he took the opportunity of making some 

 inquiries regarding the drug in question, and very recently he 

 has handed me several specimens of it obtained in the Pekin 

 shops. The information Mr. L. elicited was not very copious, in 



1 Catal Med. Sinensis, p. 41. 



