STYRAX LIQUIDUS. 273 



sufficient quantity has been collected. It is then boiled with water in 

 a large copper, by which process the resin is separated, so that it can be 

 skimmed oft*. This seems to be performed with sea water ; some 

 chloride of sodium can therefore be extracted from the drug. The 

 boiled bark is put into hair bags and squeezed under a rude lever, hot 

 water being added to assist in the separation of the resin, or as it is 

 termed yagh, i.e. oil. Maltass states that the bark is pressed in the 

 first instance per se, and afterwards treated with hot water. In either case 

 the products obtained are the opaque, grey, semi-fluid resin knowTi as 

 Liquid Storax, and the fragrant cakes of foliaceous, brown bark, 

 once common ^ but now rare in European pharmacy, called CoHex 

 Thymiamatis. 



We are indebted to M. Felix Sahut of Montpellier for a specimen of 

 the bark of Liqmda7)ibar (yinentalis, cut from the trunk of a tme tree on 

 his property at the neighbouring village of Lattes. The bark which is 

 covered with a very thick corky layer and soaked in its own fragrant 

 resin, shows no tendency to exfoliate. The investigations of linger ^ in 

 Cyprus are consequently to us inexplicable ; he asserts that the bark 

 scales off, like that of the plane, by continued exfoliation, which is not 

 the case with that of M. Sahut's tree. 



Description — Liquid Storax is a soft viscid resin, usually of the 

 consistence of honey, heavier than water, opaque and greyish brown. 

 It always contains water, which by long standing rises to the surface. 

 In one sample that had been kept more than 20 years, the resin at the 

 bottom of the bottle formed a transparent layer of a pale golden brown. 

 When liquid storax is heated, it becomes by the loss of water dark 

 brown and transparent, the solid impurities settling to the bottom. 

 Spread out in a very thin layer, it partially dries, but does not wholly 

 lose its stickiness. When free from water (which reddens litmus) it 

 dissolves in alcohol, spirit of wine, chloroform, ether, glacial acetic acid, 

 bisulphide of carbon, and most of the essential oils, but not in the most 

 volatile part of petroleum ("petroleum ether"). It has a pleasant 

 balsamic smell, especially after it has been long kept ; when recent, it 

 is contaminated with an odour of bitumen or naphtalian that is far 

 from agreeable. Its taste is sharply pungent, burning and aromatic. 



When the opaque resin is subjected to microscopic examination, 

 small brownish granules are observed in a viscid, colourless, transparent 

 liquid, besides which large drops of a mobile watery liquid may be dis- 

 tinguished. In polarized light, numerous minute crystalline fragments 

 with a few larger tabular crystals are obvious. But when thin layers 

 of the resin are left on the object glass in a warm place, feathery or 

 spicular crystals (styracin) shoot out on the edge of the clear liquid, 

 while in the large, sharply-defined drops above mentioned, rectangular 

 tables and short prisms (cinnamic acid) make their appearance. On 

 applying more warmth after the water is evaporated, all the substances 

 unite into a transparent, dark-brown, thick liquid, which exhibits no 

 crystalline structure on cooling, or only after a very long time. Among 

 the fragments of the bark occurring in the crude resin, liber fibres are 

 frequently observable. 



' It is no doubt the " Cortex Olibani " 2 XJnger u. Kotschy, Die Insel Cypem. 



met with in the tariff of 1571, in Fluckiger, Wien, 1865. 410. 

 Documenfe zur Geschichte der Pharmade, 26. 



