C 39 3 
VI. Observations on an astringent vegetable substance from China. 
By William Thomas Brande, Esq. Sec , R.S. 
Read December 12, 1816. 
The substance described in the following pages was put 
into my hands for examination by the President, who received 
it from China, with some others employed in the art of 
dying ; and although the small quantity hitherto sent to this 
country, has not enabled me to extend my experiments upon 
its useful applications as far as I could have wished, I trust 
that its chemical history will be deemed of sufficient impor- 
tance to interest the Royal Society, and to prove its usefulness 
as an article of commerce, provided it can be obtained abun- 
dantly, and at a cheap rate, which I think admits of little doubt. 
The parcel containing this substance was marked “ Oong 
poey,” a species of galls used in dying black. They have the 
appearance of irregular vesicles, the coats of which are about 
one-tenth of an inch thick, of a grey and reddish colour, 
smooth, and very brittle, and containing in their interior a 
brown powder, among which insects may be discerned by the 
microscope. Some of these vesicles were adhering to twigs 
of the tree, and they appear to be formed upon the younger 
branches 
They have a more austere and purely astringent taste than 
any other of the vegetable substances of that class I have 
met with, and they produce, when throwrn into any of the red 
salts of iron, a pure black tint. 
