— 35 — 
about an advance. The cheapest quotation for prompt in the terminal 
market, in August last year, was 19^4 florins, the highest in February 
and April of this year, 46 Y2 florins per 50 kilos. 
Under these conditions it is a difficult matter for the manufacturers 
of clove oil always to hit the right mark in the quotations given in 
the price-lists, and it is necessary, in purchasing larger quantities, to 
fix the price of the day by an exchange of telegrams. Assisted by 
large stocks bought at favourable prices, we have been able to help 
many of our clients through the crisis, and it will always be our 
endeavour to maintain our leading position in this important article. 
Taking into consideration the fact that eugenol also occurs in the 
form of esters in oil of cloves, Thorns, in a lengthy treatise on the 
valuation of clove oiU), in which he again advocates the usefulness 
of his method of eugenol -determination, mentions inter alia a modi- 
fication of this method, which renders it possible to ascertain the total 
esterified eugenol in oil of cloves, which could not be done by the 
original method. 
The modification consists of this, that the clove oil (5 gm.) serving 
for the eugenol-determination, is previously saponified in a beaker with 
20 gm. 15% soda -lye, by half-an- hour's heating on a water bath, 
and the eugenol sodium solution is separated from the sesquiterpenes 
before the benzoyl chloride is added. For this purpose the contents 
of the beaker, while still warm, are placed in a small separating funnel 
with a short delivery tube, and after separating the two layers of liquid 
the eugenol sodium solution is returned to the beaker. The residual 
sesquiterpenes are twice more washed each time with 5 cc. 15 ^/q soda 
liquor, and the lyes combined with the eugenol sodium solution. To 
this is now added the necessary quantity benzoyl chloride (6 gm.) and 
the whole shaken, when conversion takes place with a considerable 
rise in temperature. The last portions of unattacked benzoyl chloride 
are destroyed by heating for a short time on the water bath, and the 
process is continued in the usual manner 2). 
Thoms also proceeds in a slightly different manner with regard 
to the estimation of the free eugenol contained in oil of cloves, and 
he gives the following directions therefor: 
5 gm. oil of cloves are dissolved in 20 gm. ether, and this solution 
quickly extracted in a separating funnel with 20 gm. 15 ^/q soda liquor. 
The eugenol sodium solution is then placed in a beaker; the ether 
containing the sesquiterpenes is again washed twice, each time with 
5 gm. soda liquor of the same strength; the combined alkaline solutions 
^) Archiv der Pharmacie 241 (1903), 592. 
^) Comp. Gildemeister and Hoffmann, "The Volatile Oils" p. 516. 
3* 
