ON SOME VEGETABLE ALKALOIDS. 31 



An aqueous solution was treated successively with nitrate of silver and hydro- 

 chloric acid, and bichloride of platinum was finally added to the clear fluid, care 

 being taken to operate with dilute liquids and in the cold, as the platinum com- 

 pound of narcotine is very prone to change. An amorphous yellow precipitate 

 resulted, which was quickly collected, washed, and dried ; it gave these numbers 

 on ignition, — 



f 8-375 grains, dried at 212°, gave 

 \ l - 330 „ platinum. 



which lead to a percentage of 1588 ; and 15*81 is that required by the salt of 

 narcotine, whose formula is 



C 46 H 85 NO u ,HCl, PtCl 2 . 



To the nature of the reaction in this case, I would apply the remarks 

 made with reference to pa paverine under similar circumstances ; but, perhaps, 

 should not permit the subject to pass without drawing attention to the relation 

 my experiment may bear to a fact made known some time since by Wertheim. 



This chemist announced, in a preliminary notice,* that he had detected in 

 opium two new species of "narcotine," which, from their composition, he named 

 methylo and propylo-narcotine, while he was led to consider the ordinary alkaloid, 

 hitherto known, as ethylonarcotine : the whole being derived from one fundamen- 

 tal substance. I do not think the detailed account of his experiments has yet 

 been published, but it would certainly be interesting to establish the existence of 

 this series in reality, because, in that case, the ordinary narcotine, with which I 

 worked, would seem to have no longer any replaceable hydrogen, and be the first 

 instance of a natural, or indeed of any compound nitrogenous analogue of ammo- 

 nium or a metal, unless papaverine be similarly constituted. In the absence of 

 positive proofs, resulting from experiment, nothing can at present be said further 

 as to the nature of these known and unknown bases ; but the question seems to 

 me very interesting and worthy of being settled decisively, Wertheim's being an 

 unsupported statement, particularly as, chemically, there is nothing to distinguish 

 narcotine and papaverine from other natural alkaloids, as a class, or to assi- 

 milate them to ammonium. 



Behaviour of Cotarnine with Iodide of Ethyl. 



Hydriodate of Cotarnine. — Cotarnine is a base derived from narcotine by oxi- 

 dation ; some of it was treated exactly in the manner just described. It was found to 

 be completely converted into an hydriodate, which remained, on distilling off the 

 excess of alcohol and iodide of ethyl, as a red-brown oily mass, highly soluble in 

 hot, insoluble in cold, water, and not taking on the crystalline state under any cir- 

 cumstances. This salt was the hydriodate of cotarnine ; but being of itself no more 



* Journal fur Praktische Chemie, vol. liii., p. 431 ; Chem. Gazette, 1852, p. 36. 

 VOL. XXI. PART I. I 



