— 101 - 



wormwood oil may well be regarded as very favourable, provided the parties 

 who control the crop know how to handle the market to their own pecu- 

 niary advantage. 



An oil prepared in Dalmatia from wild-grown wormwood 1 ) gave 

 sp.gr. 0,9188 (15°); acid v. 1,3, ester v. 64,4. It was soluble in its own 

 vol. 80°/o alcohol, the solution remaining clear when more alcohol was 

 added. So far as aroma is concerned, this oil, which has a brown colour, 

 is by no means able to compete with wormwood oil from cultivated herb. 

 It is possible that the parent-plant of this oil was not Artemisia Absinthium, L., 

 but another species of Artemisia, but we have been unable to obtain any 

 information with regard to this. 



As a result of the Acts prohibiting the use of absinthe 2 ) which 

 have been passed in France and Switzerland, a whole series of papers 

 dealing with methods of estimating thujone in liqueurs have made their 

 appearance in recent years, and have been referred to more or less in 

 detail in these Reports 3 ). The decree regulating the enforcement of the 

 Swiss Federal Act on the Prohibition of Absinthe of 5 th October 1910, 

 prescribes inter alia that the quantitative estimation of thujone shall be 

 carried out by Legal-Cuniasse's method, as modified by Rocques. This 

 decree has led H. Enz 4 ) to call attention to the disadvantages of the said 

 method and to propose certain improvements on it. But, according to 

 Enz, the determination of thujone will still remain uncertain, because 

 certain other constituents of the oil, when treated with the reagents 

 mentioned in the method, also give a red coloration which resembles that 

 of the thujone reaction, hence a positive result of the test does not warrant 

 the absolutely certain conclusion that thujone is present, although the 

 non-occurrence of the red coloration is proof of the absence of that 

 compound. We must content ourselves with this brief reference to Enz's 

 paper, and we may mention at the same time that E. Philippe and Th. v. Fellen- 

 berg 5 ) have also published a short article criticising several of Enz's state- 

 ments, in answer to which the latter has published a rejoinder 6 ). 



R. C. Roark 7 ) reports on an unusual oil of wormwood oil which was 

 distilled about 10 years ago by A. S. Drew, of Farris Corners, Wis., U. S. A. 



*) Comp. foot-note p. 63. 



2) Report April 1907, 103; April 1908, 119; November 1908, 128; April 1909, 92. 



3 ) Report April 1907, 103; October 1907, 98; November 1908, 127; April 1909, 92; 

 October 1909, 129. 



*) Schweiz. Wochenschr. f. Chem. u. Pharm. 49 (1911), 337. 



■*) Ibidem 418. 



*•) Ibidem 507. 



") Midland Drugg. and pharm. Review 55 (1911), 237. 



