72 HISTORY OF GEINE. 



APPENDIX TO CHAPTER IV. 

 HISTORY OF GEINE. 



Some account of the chemical history of a sub- 

 stance which has caused no little discussion in Jate 

 agricultural reports, and publications, may not be- 

 here misplaced. It may tend to soften the doubts of 

 those who are, and with reason, apt to mistrust the 

 utility of a substance, upon whose chemical nature, 

 there is such an apparent difference of opinion. If 

 farmers are to wait till doctors agree, there will be 

 no harvest. Happily this discussion is in no wise 

 connected with the practical application of geine. 

 It is a difference about names, not things. In 1797, 

 Vauquelin, a distinguished French chemist, gave an 

 account of a substance which had exuded from the 

 bark of an elm tree. It was a shining, brittle, black 

 substance, insoluble in alcohol, soluble in hot water, 

 with a brown color, and contained potash. 



In 1802, Klaproth, a Swedish analyst, received 

 from Palermo, a specimen of this elm gum, and found 

 it contained a portion of resinous matter, and con- 



