I 
— 70 — 
The ketones are present in about equal proportion. The presence of 
terpenes (pinene, limonene) leads to the suspicion that the oil examined 
was adulterated. 
Power and Lees had at first attempted to separate the ketones of 
rue oil from the alcohols by treatment with benzoyl chloride, in the 
expectation that they would subsequently be able to obtain the high- 
boiling benzoic esters of the alcohols by fractionating. But, as Lees ^) 
states in a later work, this method proved unsuitable, as the ketones 
also yielded high-boiling condensation products with benzoyl chloride, 
which on further examination were recognised as the benzoic esters 
of olefinic alcohols. Their formation may be explained by the follow- 
ing formula : 
CgH^COCl R,v .CO.C^H. — HQ . 
R,.CO.CH,.R, > )C< > \C-CO.C,H, 
K,'CH^^ \C1 R., — CH^ 
The compounds correspond to the enol-form of acidyl aceto-acetates 
produced by Claisen and Haase'^). On hydrolysis they are recon- 
verted into the original ketones with intermediate formation of homo- 
logous vinyl alcohols. 
In the course of an examination of oil of rue carried out with Power, 
Lees^) produced from secondary hexyl aceto-acetic ether, by splitting 
off the ketone, methyl ^-methyl hexyl ketone, which was obtained in 
a yield of 80 per cent, in the form of a pleasant smelling oil of the 
boiling point 184° at 769 mm, and the specific gravity (d 0,8319. 
Its oxime is liquid; the semicarbazone shows the melting point 75°. 
Oil of Muscatel Sage, which is characterised by an odour 
approaching that of ambergris, has lately been purchased in large 
quantities, which cannot be replaced until the late autumn. We have 
only a few ounces at disposal. 
Sandalwood Oil, East Indian. With regard to the disease 
which has broken out in some districts among the sandalwood plan- 
tations, and which we first mentioned in our Report of October last 
year, there is now published in number i of "The Indian Forester'^ 
(January 1903) a very detailed report from the Government botanist, 
C. A. Barber of Madras, who has inspected these districts by order 
of the Government. We reproduce below the most essential points 
of this report: — 
The disease, called "spike", appears to be of recent occurrence; it is 
believed that the first traces have shown themselves 4 to 5 years ago. Since 
that time whole tracts have been cleared by it, especially in locahties where 
I 
^) Journ. chem. Soc. 83 (1903), 145. 
^) Berliner Berichte 33 (1900), 1242. 
^) Journ. chem. Soc. 81 (1902), 1594. 
