912 
INDIAN MEDICINAL PLANTS. 
Flowers purple without and within. Found throughout 
India. 
Use: — The young fruits, sold as Oharbhuli in Bombay, and 
Maratia mughu in Madras, are said to be sedative and slightly 
intoxicating (Ainslie). 
Hyoscyamine is the predominant alkaloid accompanied in most cases by 
scopolamine, present in the leaves, seeds, roots, fruit and stems. No atropine 
can be detected ; but there is evidence of the presence of a third alkaloid 
in the roots. 
Indian plant is quite equal to the European one with regard to total 
content of alkaloids, the figures obtained (referred to dry material) being:— 
seeds, O' 186 ; fruits, 0 46 ; leaves, 0'41-0'45 ; stems, 0'25-0'26 ; and roots, 0'214 
per cent.— [Bull. Imp. Inst. 1011.] 
The following is the composition of the oil obtained from the seeds : — 
palmitic acid, 10 p.c.; daturic acid (normal heptadecylic acid) 2'5 ; oleic acid 
62; linolic acid, 15 ; unsaponiflable, 1; and glycerol, 9'6 percent. The oil 
also contains small quantities of acids of higher molecular weight than those 
mentioned, but not stearic acid. Daturic acid is more soluble In alcohol than 
palmitic acid. -J. Ch. I. May 31, 1912, p. 500. 
By distilling the leaves with superheated steam, 0'045 per cent of a 
dark-brown oil with a strong tobacco-like odour was obtained. The oil had 
an acid reaction and solidified at 20°C.; its sp. gr. was 0 9440 at SO'C. After 
purification in ethereal solution with animal charcoal, it had the acid value 
62'4 ; “Saponification value 9'57." After saponification, an alcohol with a 
strong tobacco-like odour was obtained by distillation with steam.— J. Ch. I. 
15. 12 1910, p. 1408. 
D. Uoldo extracted 16*7 per cent, of oil from the air-dpied seeds of Datura 
Stramonium by means of benzene. The alkaloid, daturine was apparently 
not extracted by the solvent, or at least could not be detected in the oil. 
The oil thus obtained was green to yellowish- 1 brown in colour and had a 
characteristic odour. On standing it yielded a dark flocculent resin-like 
deposit. The filtered oil had an efflux velocity in Engler's apparatus nine 
times less than that of water at 20°C. Its specific gravity at 16°C. was 0‘9175. 
When cooled to O°0. it began to gelatinise ; at— 15’C. it became viscous, and 
thick at — l&'C. It dried forming a firm skin, when heated in a thin layer for 
13 hours at 50°C. whilst at the ordinary temperature it was still liquid after 
■23 days, and only showed signs of drying after 35 days. Its io&ine value was 
113, and its saponification value, 186. The fatty acids were judged to contain 
solid unsaturated readily oxidisable acids as well as solid saturated acids. 
The iodine value of the liquid acids was exceptionally low. The solid fatty 
acids fractionally precipitated by moans of magnesium acetate, yielded, in 
addition to daturic acid, CnH M 0 2 (m. pt. 65'C.) an acid of molecular weight 
261, and m. pt. 60°-62'C, (palmitic acid, molecular weight 256, and m. pt. 62°C.), 
and an acid molting at 53°-54°B., and having a molecular weight of over 286. 
J. Ch. I. Dec. 16, 1902 p. 1469. 
