MYRISTICA MOSCHATA. 
79 
meg. The watery infusion is limpid, yellowish, having drops of oil 
swimming on the surface. On expression, nutmegs yield nearly six 
ounces in the pound, of a butter-like oil,* of a yellowish colour 
when recent, but changing to a mottled white, and becoming hard 
by age. This oil is fat, easily melted, and on bringing a candle near 
it the melted oil takes fire, burning with a vivid, broken flame, with 
scarcely any smoke or soot. Nutmeg yields also on distillation with 
water about part of their weight of an essential oil, limpid, 
transparent, lighter than water, and of a pale straw colour, possess- 
ing the odour and flavour of the nutmeg in a concentrated degree. 
Rectified spirit extracts the whole virtues of nutmegs by infusion, 
but carries over very little of it in distillation. The component parts 
of nutmeg, according to the analysis of Neumann, are starch, gum, 
wax, volatile oil, and fixed fat oil ; the last appears to be a vegeta- 
ble cerate, or a triple compound, consisting of wax, volatile oil, and 
fixed oil. The genuine oil of nutmegs, or, as it is commonly called, 
oil of mace, is frequently adulterated, and a spurious sort is sold in 
the shops, which contains very little, if any, of the genuine oil, but 
is chiefly composed of fatty substances, combined with a little of the 
essential oil to give it a flavour. 
Mace in its taste and odour resembles that of nutmeg, but is 
somewhat more pungent and bitter, of a reddish brown or golden 
yellow colour, tough, laciniated, flexible, thin, and unctuous to the 
feel ; alcohol and ether extract its active principles. 
Medical Properties and Uses. Both nutmegs and mace 
are cordial, stimulant, carminative and gently astringent ; these pro- 
pei'ties depend entirely upon the essential oil they contain. They are 
sometimes ordered in diarrhoea, flatulent colic, languors, and to 
check nausea and vomiting ; but they are chiefly employed as an 
adjunct to other medicines to cover their disagreeable taste, and 
obviate the griping eflfects of drastic purgatives. Nutmeg when 
taken in large quantities produces drowsiness, stupor, and insensi- 
bility,! followed by delirium ; similar symptoms are said to follow 
an over dose of mace : hence in some particular habits, and in those 
predisposed to apoplexy, nutmeg and mace should be cautiously 
prescribed. Both the expressed and volatile oils are sometimes 
* This oil is erroneously called oil of mace. — Ed. 
t Collen's Mat. Med. toI. ii. 204. Bontius also speaks of their nareotic effects,, 
which in India have been frequently felt. 
