Schunck. — The Chemistry of Chlorophyll. 87 
not quite apparent. Arthur Meyer 1 , having examined 
Pringsheim’s hypochlorin with regard to its chemical pro- 
perties as well as its appearance under the microscope, came 
to the conclusion that it is identical with Hoppe-Seyler’s 
chlorophyllan. 
In several memoirs published in the years 1881 and 1884 
Robert Sachsse 2 has given an account of two substances of 
which he says that they are contained in the mixture known 
under the name of modified chlorophyll, and which he calls 
a-phaeochlorophyll and / 3 -phaeochlorophyll respectively. Of 
these he has given a general description, but as regards their 
absorption-spectra he merely states that they are nearly the 
same as that of modified chlorophyll. Both products are 
amorphous, so that they cannot be identical with Fremy’s 
phyllocyanin, nor with Filhol’s ‘ matiere noire,’ which are 
crystalline. 
I am inclined to think, after carefully considering what has 
been written on the subject, that no derivative of chlorophyll 
showing the absorption-spectrum of Russell and Lapraik’s a- 
chlorophyll has so far been isolated. 
I shall now proceed to give an account of my own experi- 
ments on the action of acids on chlorophyll 3 . I may state 
that these experiments do not refer to such products as 
are due to the action of weak acids on chlorophyll nor 
to those formed during the first stage of decomposition by 
strong acids. Some discrepancies may therefore possibly 
be discovered between my results and those of some other 
observers. 
Fresh green leaves — I prefer grass to any other material — 
are to be extracted with strong boiling alcohol, and the dark 
green extract having been poured off from the exhausted 
leaves is allowed to stand for a day or two, when it deposits 
a quantity of wax, fatty matter, and other impurities which 
1 Das Chlorophyllkorn, Leipzig, 1883. 
2 Chem. Centralblatt, 1881, pp. 169, 236; ib. 1884, p. 113. 
3 Proceedings of the Royal Society, No. 240, 1885. 
