HERBA SCOPARII. 171 



consist of a simple cylindrical thin-walled cell, the surface of which is 

 beset with numerous extremely small protuberances. 



The large, bright yellow, odorous flowers, which become brown in 

 drying, are mostly solitary in the axils of the leaves ; they have a 

 persistent campanulate calyx divided into two lips minutely toothed, 

 and a long subulate style, curved round on itself. The legume is oblong 

 compressed, 1^ to 2 inches long by about h an inch wide, fringed with 

 hairs alongf the edse. It contains 10 to 12 olive-coloured albuminous 



• • • • " 



seeds, the funicle of which is expanded into a large fleshy strophiole. 

 They have a bitterish taste, and are devoid of starch. 



The portion of the plant used in pharmacy is the younger herbaceous 

 branches, which are required both fresh and dried. In the former state 

 they emit when bruised a peculiar odour which is lost in drying. They 

 have a nauseous bitter taste. 



Chemical Composition — Stenhouse^ discovered in broom tops 

 two interesting principles, Scoparin, C^HrO^", an indifi*erent or some- 

 what acid body, and the alkaloid Sparteine, CH'^N", the fii-st soluble 

 in water or spirit and crystallizing in yellowish tufts, the second a 

 colourless oily liquid heavier than water and sparingly soluble in it, 

 boiling at 288° C. 



To obtain scoparin, a watery decoction of the plant is concentrated 

 so as to form a jelly after standing for a day or two. This is then 

 washed with a small quantity of cold water, dissolved in hot water and 

 again allowed to repose. By repeating this treatment with the 

 addition of a little hydrochloric acid, the chlorophyll may at length be 

 separated and the scoparin obtained as a gelatinous mass, which dries as 

 an amorphous, brittle, pale yellow, neutral substance, devoid of taste 

 and smell. Its solution in hot alcohol deposits it partly in crystals and 

 partly as jelly, which after drying are alike in composition. Hlasiwetz 

 showed (1866) that scoparin when melted with potash is resolved, like 

 kino or quercetin, into Phloroglucin, CfffO^ and P rotocatechuic Add, 

 2 C'H'0^ 



The acid mother-liquors from which scoparin has been obtained 

 when concentrated and distilled with soda, yield besides ammonia a 

 very bitter oily liquid. Sparteine. To obtain it pure, it requu-es to be 

 repeatedly rectified, dried by chloride of calcium, and distilled in a 

 current of dry carbonic acid. It is colourless, but becomes brown by 

 exposure to light ; it has at first an odour of aniline, but this is altered 

 by rectification. Sparteine has a decidedly alkaline reaction and readily 

 neutralizes acids, forming crystallizable salts which are extremely bitter. 

 Conine, nicotine, and sparteine are the only volatile alkaloids devoid 

 of oxygen hitherto known to exist in the vegetable kingdom. 



Mills" extracted sparteine simply by acidulated water which he 

 concentrated and then distilled with soda. The distillate was then 

 saturated with hydrochloric acid, evaporated to dryness, and submitted 

 to distillation with potash. The oily sparteine thus obtained was dried 

 by prolonged heating with sodium in a current of hydrogen, and finally 

 rectified per se. Mills succeeded in replacing one or two equivalents of 

 the hydrogen of sparteine by one or two of C'H^ (ethyl). From 150 lb. 



1 PJiil Trans. 1851. 422-431. -' Journ. of C'hem. Soc. xv. (1862) I.; 



Gmelin's Chem. xvi. (1864) 282. 



