184 
THE BITTER PRINCIPLE OF GENTIAN. 
I am not aware of any physiological experiments instituted with berberina or any of 
its chemical combinations. But some of the drugs in which it occurs are still highly 
prized as tonics, and are regarded as possessing special action upon the liver; this is, 
among others, the case with the bark of berberis and with calumba. Podophyllum has 
long been regarded as a vegetable substitute, to a certain extent, for calomel; and the 
question arises, whether the pure resin has any action at all upon the liver, or whether 
it is merely cathartic, being directed to that organ only when combined with berberina ? 
This is a subject requiring investigation by the physiologist; but, to be of any value, 
the experiments ought to be conducted with the pure principles, and not with a mixture 
of known and unknown constituents, even if this was commonly called, after the fashion 
of the Eclectics, by a name rightfully belonging to a pure chemical principle. 
In the preparation of the resin of podophyllum, by precipitation with water, a con¬ 
siderable quantity of muriate of berberina may afterwards be obtained, and this salt 
should be collected, because it undoubtedly possesses some therapeutic value. It will be 
remembered that muriate of berberina is identical with the so-called hydrastine of the 
Eclectics.— Amer. Journ. of Pharm ., July, 1863. 
COETEX MUSENiE. 
This bark was formerly known in commerce as Cortex Brciyerce anthelminticce, under 
the belief that it was that of the tree the flowers of which are known as Koosso. The 
source of this bark has long remained in doubt, and the plant from which it is obtained, 
a tree, was placed in the Order of Leguminos®, until Buckner, Hochstetter, and Steudel 
proved it to be the Rottlera Schimperi (Nat. Ord. Enphorbiacece, sect. Croioneoe), a 
large tree of Abyssinia. The bark of this tree, mixed with koosso, is employed in that 
country for the treatment of tape-worm. Musena bark, as it occurs in commerce, is in 
quills of several inches in length, from one to two inches in width, the outer surface very 
uneven, rough, and fissured, the epidermis of a brown colour, underneath which there is 
a very thin greenish cellular coat overlying a comparatively thick periderm of a pale- 
yellow colour and hard granular structure, and beneath this the liber of a very tough 
and long fibrated tissue. It possesses no odour ; the periderm has little taste, while the 
liber possesses a peculiar sweetish nauseating one, and causes an acrid, long-continuing 
sensation in the fauces. C. Thiel, who has lately examined this drug, found as the 
active ingredient, a non-crystallizable substance of a very acrid taste, having many pro¬ 
perties in common with saponin, but distinguished from it by a greater solubility in 
alcohol. Besides this, the Musena bark contains a fatty wax-like substance, a yellowish 
colouring matter, extractive, and a bitter principle. It yields 5^ per cent, of ashes, consist¬ 
ing of potassa, soda, lime, magnesia, sesquioxide of iron, hydrochloric, sulphuric, phosphoric, 
carbonic, and a large quantity of silicic acid. Very little is known as to the thera¬ 
peutical action of the drug. Girtler, of Vienna, has prepared an alcoholic extract, which 
is now being tried by the profession.— Neues Jahrb. f. Pharm., bd. xviii., January, 1863, 
p. 374, and Amer. Journ. Pharm. 
THE BITTEK PRINCIPLE OF GENTIAN. 
Chemists have long failed to discover or isolate the body to which gentian owes its 
purely bitter taste, though there has been eliminated an acid principle, gentianic acid. 
Ludwig and Kromeyer have at last obtained it from an alcoholic extract of the fresh 
root of gentian ( [lutea ), the watery solution of which transferred its bitterness to animal 
charcoal by two successive treatments. The charcoal was extracted with alcohol, the 
tincture evaporated, the residue freed from precipitable matter by means of oxide of lead, 
and after removal of the latter by sulphuretted hydrogen, evaporated to the consistence 
of a syrup; the latter precipitated the principle by agitation with ether. This gentio- 
picrin is crystallizable, is readily soluble in water and alcohol but not in ether, neutral, 
and not precipitated either by tannin or subacetate of lead. It is a glucoside, for contact 
with mineral acids, as well as oxalic and acetic acids, splits it into fermentable sugar and 
a brownish, yellow, amorphous body, gentiogenin. The formula for gentio- 
picrin requires— 
