— 4i — 



Elemi Oil. It is well known that the botanical origin of Manila 

 elemi resin, which in the Philippines is called "brea", has up to the 

 present not yet been determined with certainty. It was only know that 

 the resin was obtained from the Burseraceae, and the suspected mother- 

 plants were either Idea Abilo Blanco, or species of Canarium. We 

 see from an article in The Chemist and Druggist 1 } that this question 

 has now at last been decided on the part of the recently established 

 Bureau of Science of the Government of the Philippine Islands, by the 

 work of E. D. Merrill, who by a detailed examination of the botanical 

 material has confirmed the statement first expressed by Bentley and 

 Trim en, that elemi is obtained from a species of Canarium similar 

 to Canarium commune. According to Merrill's researches, the plant 

 yielding elemi is Canarium luzonicum (Miq.) A. Gray, a species peculiar 

 to the Philippines, which is closely allied to, but not identical with 

 Canarium commune. Other species of Canarium no doubt also contain 

 elemi, but for export only the resin obtained from Canarium luzonicum 

 comes under consideration. Icica Abilo Blanco does not yield elemi 

 resin. No mention is unfortunately made of the source from which 

 the statements reproduced in The Chemist and Druggist are derived. 

 In The Philippine Journal of Science published by the Bureau of Science, 

 in which we expected to find the original work, we only found in a 

 study from the hand of Merrill on the flora of the Lamao Forest 

 Reserve a short description of a few species of Canarium 2 ), but no 

 remarks regarding the above subject. 



A long time ago 3 ) we reported on the examination of an elemi 

 oil fraction which was formed from the highest-boiling portions of the 

 oil and was heavier than water. We now wish to supplement the in- 

 formation then given by the following results. We recently examined a 

 fraction with the following constants: diso 1,025; n D -|-2 15'; soluble in 

 1,5 vol. 70 per cent, alcohol; sap. no. 2,8; sap. no. after acetylation 81,4. 

 When fractionating it was, however, found that the fraction still con- 

 tained constituents boiling below 1 oo° (5 mm. pressure), which, in view 

 of their high acetylation number, consisted probably chiefly of alcohols. 

 From the first runnings on acetylation an oil with a distinct odour of 

 spearmint could be fractionated off, which boiled at 82 to 83,5° (3 mm. 

 pressure) and had the acetylation number 196,5. Although we were 

 unable to confirm by positive proofs our assumption that we had here 

 possibly to do with the acetic ester of the dihydrocumin alcohol 4 ) 



*) Chemist and Druggist 69 (1906), 678. 



2 ) The Philippine Journal of Science 1 (1906), Supplement I, 71. 



3 ) Report October 1896, 29; comp. Gildemeister and Hoffmann, The 

 Volatile Oils, p. 490. 



4 ) Report April 1904, 56. 



