262 SCIENTIFIC AND APPLIED PHARMACOGNOSY 



On macerating 0.5 gm. of Sassafras Pith in 25 cc. of cold distilled 

 water for several hours and filtering through cotton, a mucilaginous 

 solution is obtained which is not precipitated upon the addition 

 of 1 c.c. of alcohol. 



GOTO. Cortex Goto Verus, Goto Bark. The bark of an un- 

 known tree growing in Bolivia and apparently belonging to the 

 Lauracese. 



Description. In flattened or transversely curved pieces, from 

 2 to 20 cm. in length and from 1 to 7 cm. in width, the bark from 7 

 to 20 mm. in thickness; outer surface reddish-brown, occasionally 

 with grayish patches of foliaceous lichens, nearly smooth or longi- 

 tudinally fissured and occasionally with transverse clefts, the smooth 

 bark being marked with large lenticular lenticels or large branch 

 scars; inner surface very coarsely longitudinally striate; hard, and 

 fracture very tough; fractured surface light reddish-brown, porous 

 and showing numerous yellowish groups of sclerenchymatous cells 

 and fibers; odor distinct, aromatic, somewhat camphoraceous; taste 

 aromatic and pungent. 



Inner Structure. Numerous irregular layers of cork cells having 

 a brownish amorphous content; a layer of tangentially elongated 

 cells, those nearest the cortical phelloderm possessing strongly thick- 

 ened side walls; a phelloderm layer of thick-walled more or less 

 collapsed cells; secondary cortex composed of strands of phloem sep- 

 arated by medullary rays which are from 2 to 3 cells wide. The 

 phloem consists of (1) small groups of sclerenchymatous fibers which 

 occur in tangentially elongated strands; (2) groups of stone cells 

 similarly disposed and consisting either of isodiametric cells, very 

 irregular branching forms, or elongated fibers ; (3) a distinct leptome 

 of collapsed cells and among which are distributed (4) numerous oil 

 cells having a diameter of 0.040 mm. The cells of the medullary 

 rays are in part metamorphosed to stone cells. Starch occurs in 

 form of either single or compound grains, the individual grains being 

 either spheroidal or ellipsoidal, and from 0.003 to 0.020 mm. in 

 length. Small acicular crystals are also said to occur in the med- 

 ullary ray cells. 



Constituents. A pale yellow volatile oil, having an aromatic 

 odor and pungent taste; a light yellow crystalline substance, cotoin, 

 1.5 per cent, which is acrid and sternutatory, soluble in boiling water 

 and alcohol, and which possesses the activity of the drug; also a 

 soft resin; dicotoin; pseudodicotoin; paracotoin; tannic acid, and 

 the following organic acids : formic, acetic and butyric. 



