APPEND.] ANIL DE PERNAMBUCO. 



371 



Anil de Pernambuco, Koanophyllon tinctoria: — 

 Arrud. Cent. Plant. Pern. 



This is a shrub which grows to the height of twelve 

 i'eet or more. It is of the class syngenesia ; the leaves 



northernmost parts of the Brazilian dominions, the capitanias of 

 Rio Grande and Seara, between the latitude of three and seven de- 

 grees north ; it is said to be the production of a tree of slow growth, 

 called by the natives carnauba, which also produces a gum used as 

 food for men, and another substance employed for fattening poultry. 

 " The wax in its rough state is in the form of a coarse pale gray 

 powder, soft to the touch, and mixed with various impurities, con- 

 sisting chiefly of fibres of the bark of the tree, which, when separated 

 by a sieve, amount to above 40 per cent. It has an agreeable odour, 

 somewhat resembling new hay, but scarcely any taste." 



{Here follow various Chemical Experiments which I wish I could insert, 

 but they are too long.) 



" Having been unsuccessful in my attempts to bleach the wax in 

 its original state, I made some experiments to ascertain whether its 

 colour could be more easily destroyed, after it had been acted upon 

 by nitric acid, and found that, by exposing it spread upon glass to 

 the action oflight.it became in the course of three weeks of a pale 

 straw colour, and on the surface nearly white.* The same change 

 was produced by steeping the wax, in thin plates, in an aqueous so- 

 lution of oxymuriatic gas, but I have not hitherto succeeded in ren- 

 dering it perfectly white." 



{Other Chemical Experiments follow, which are of considerable length.) 



" From the preceding detail of experiments, it appears, that al- 

 though the South American vegetable wax possesses the character- 

 istic properties of bees' wax, it differs from that substance in many of 

 its chemical habitudes ; it also differs from the other varieties of wax, 

 namely, the wax of the myrica cerifera, of lac, and of white lac. The 

 attempts which have been made to bleach the wax have been con- 

 ducted on a small scale; but, from the experiments related, it ap- 

 pears that after the colour has been changed by the action of very 



* The portion which the Governor of Rio Grande gave to me was in the 

 form of a cake, which could not be pierced, but was brittle ; it was of a pale 

 straw colour. — Trantl. 



B B 2 



