PHYSOSTIGMA VENENOSUM. 



315 



Alcoholic 

 extract. 



requesting a supply of the beans, remarked in a letter under- date isea. 

 Xov. 24th, 1861, that he had been able to procure but few, " as 

 the people did not like to give them to Europeans." There is 

 no reason, however, to suppose that this" reluctance will continue 

 if a good money-value become attached to them. 



The best form in which to employ the Ordeal Bean as a Mode of 

 medicine is a point of importance to the pharmacist, but, one Em P lo y ment - 

 upon which further experience is required. Dr. Christison found 

 that the active matter of the bean could be separated by alcohol, 

 and he obtained (as already stated) 2*7 per cent, of extract by 

 this menstruum. I found that upon reducing the bean to a coarse 

 powder and exhausting it with cold alcohol (sp. gr. -838), 2 - 3 per 

 cent, of dry extract was obtained ; and upon further exhausting 

 the residue with similar alcohol at a boiling temperature, a 

 further product of extract amounting to 2'2 percent. Whether 

 these extracts are alike in power is at present hardly proved, 

 but the result of a single experiment appears to show that the 

 second is as powerful as the first. The alcoholic extract rubbed 

 down with water, forms a turbid liquid which, however efficient, is 

 certainly not an elegant preparation, and it has been said rapidly 

 to spoil. It has been prepared of several strengths, so that one 

 minim may represent, i, 1, 2, or 4 grains of the bean. In glyce- 

 rine, the alcoholic extract dissolves freely, yielding a tolerably 

 clear solution ; and if this menstruum be unobjectionable as an 

 application to the eye, it will certainly prove convenient pharma- 

 ceutically, as it affords a solution not liable to change by keeping. 



The residue of the bean, after the extract had been obtained 

 as above described, was dried ; and with the view of ascertaining 

 whether it still contained a poisonous principle, some of it, mixed 

 with bread and lard, was administered to a mouse and rat. 

 Neither animal would eat the mixture very readily ; the mouse 

 after some hours ate a pellet containing five grains of the residue 

 and died in the course of the next day. To the rat, which at 

 intervals ate a much larger quantity, the residue also proved 

 fatal in about forty hours. These experiments show that the 

 bean had not been entirely deprived of its active properties. 

 [N. Repert.f. Pharm., xii., 289.] 



Glycerine 

 solution. 



