— 106 — 



with water with emulsin added, yielded 0,142 gm. hydrocyanic acid. 

 The alcoholic extract from 1 kilo leaves, after removal of the alcohol 

 and substitution of the latter by water after invertin and emulsin had 

 been added, yielded 0,156 gm. hydrocyanic acid. In the fresh leaves 

 and also in the other organs of common elder, the authors detected 

 invertin; the blossoms contain most of it, whilst the young fruit appears 

 to have the smallest content. Small quantities of emulsin are also 

 present in the leaves, blossoms, and fruit. In addition to two varieties 

 of Sambucus nigra, which also contained the glucoside, the authors 

 examined Sambucus racetnosa L. and Sambucus Ebulus L., but in neither 

 of these could a glucoside be detected. But possibly the latter may 

 contain another body which can be split up by emulsin. In the 

 further course of the examination, Bourquelot and Danjou 1 ) suc- 

 ceeded in obtaining in crystalline from the glucoside which they had 

 hitherto not been able to produce in the pure state. It crystallises 

 in long colourless needles, is odourless and has a slightly bitter taste. 

 It is readily soluble in water, cold alcohol, and acetic ether, almost 

 insoluble in ether; it softens at 149 and melts at 151 to 15 2°. It 

 is optically active (Md — 76,3°), does not lose weight when heated 

 to ioo°, and does not reduce Fehling's solution. The hitherto un- 

 known glucoside which resembles amygdalin, and which the authors 

 have named sambunigrin, is split up by emulsin into glucose (6 1,2 8 °/ ), 

 hydrocyanic acid (8,6i°/ ), and benzaldehyde; it appears to be isom- 

 eric with the amygdonitril glucoside C 14 H 17 N0 6 of E. Fischer. In 

 a further work Bourquelot and Danjou 2 ) describe in detail the 

 production, purification and properties of sambunigrin. It should still 

 be mentioned that the glucoside can also be split up by the ferment 

 of Aspergillus niger, and that, as a matter of fact, the above-mentioned 

 formula C 14 H 17 N0 6 belongs to it. 



Stimulated by this work, L. van Itallie 3 ) has again taken up his 

 earlier investigations on the presence of hydrocyanic acid in plants 

 and he was not only able to confirm the results of Bourquelot 

 and Danjou, but also became acquainted with a new occurrence of 

 hydrocyanic acid. In the leaves of Thalictrum aquilegifolium L. he 

 detected in 100 gm., 0,05 to 0,06 gm. hydrocyanic acid, in 142 gm. twigs 

 he found 0,0044 g m -> but in 200 gm. roots no trace of hydrocyanic 

 acid at all. The leaves of Thalictrum flavum L., Thalictrum minus L., 

 and Thalictrum glaucum did not contain hydrocyanic acid. The acid 

 originates from a glucoside which, like the phaseolunatin discovered 

 by Dunstan and Henry in Phaseolus lunatus L. ? can be split up 



*) Ibidem p. 219. Compt. rend. 141 (1905), 598. 

 7 ) Journ. de Pharm. et Chim. VI. 22 (1905), 385. 

 3 ) Ibidem p. 337, 



