COCHINEAL 699 



Constituents. Three bitter principles: lactucin, which occurs in 

 white rhombic prisms that are sparingly soluble in water; lactuco- 

 picrin, a brown, amorphous, very bitter principle which is readily 

 soluble in water and alcohol; and lactucic acid, a yellow, very bitter 

 substance crystallizing with difficulty and colored red by alkalies. 

 The drug also contains about 50 per cent of a colorless, odorless and 

 tasteless crystalline principle, lactucerin (lactucon); /3- and a- 

 lactucerol in the form of acetates; volatile oil; mannitol; organic 

 acids, as citric, malic and oxalic, and 7 to 10 per cent of ash. 



A mydriatic alkaloid has been found in Lactuca virosa and in L. 

 muralis. 



Dicoma Anomala. A small plant (Fam. Compositse), which is 

 known in South Africa by the Kaffir name of in-nyongwane. A 

 chemical examination showed it to consist of a small amount of an 

 essential oil, a reducing sugar; a colorless, crystalline glucoside; 

 a yellow amorphous product, which, on hydrolysis with alkali, gave 

 3 : 4-dihydroxycinnamic acid; an amorphous alkaloid; hentria- 

 contane; a phytosterol; and a mixture of fatty acids. The air- 

 dried plant contained about 6 per cent of resinous material, from which 

 a number of the above-mentioned substances were isolated. Power, 

 Pharm. Journ., 1913, p. 694. 



ANIMAL DRUGS 



A number of animal drugs are used in medicine and a few are 

 official in all of the Pharmacopoeias. As a rule their study is much 

 neglected by students of pharmacy and more attention should be 

 given them, as they furnish some of the most important drugs 

 used by man. Among the more valuable are, cantharides, cochi- 

 neal and musk. In certain instances more or less definite principles 

 are isolated, as pepsin, the proteolytic ferment found in the stomach 

 of 'the hog; pancreatin, a mixture of enzymes existing in the pancreas 

 of the hog and the ox; and wool fat, the purified fat of sheep's wool. 

 During recent years very great interest has been manifested in the 

 study of animal organs and a number are used either in the dried 

 condition, or in the form of extracts, and in some cases, as from the 

 suprarenal glands of the sheep, definite principles are extracted and 

 employed. 



Coccus. Cochineal. The female insect enclosing her young 

 larvae Coccus Cacti (Fam. Coccidse). The cochineal insect feeds 

 upon various species of the Cactacese, more especially the Nopa 

 plant, Nopalea (Opuntia) coccinellifera, a native of Mexico and 



