214 
BRITISH PHARMACEUTICAL CONFERENCE. 
acid salt of atropia, malic and mucic acids, chlorophyll, and a peculiar prin¬ 
ciple,^ similar to chlorophyll. 
Hot water extracts a very large proportion of phosphates and sulphates, 
which are readily deposited in a crystalline form. At different seasons the 
organic salts are found to offer the greatest variation; many are detected only 
after the fall of the flower. X could not detect mucic acid in any part of the bel¬ 
ladonna plants except the seeds. The presence of malic acid in stramonium 
seeds increases after the fall of the flower, but is also found in the juice ex¬ 
tracted from the leaves. In nearly all cases the juices extracted from the 
seeds react much more strongly on litmus paper than the juices from the 
leaves or stalks, and it is a notorious fact that this acid reaction disappears 
by drying the plants. 
The following is the percentage of active principles and salts obtained by 
my experiments from the following plants, grown under different conditions 
Name and Condition of Plants,. 
Seeds. 
Leaves. 
Leaves, 
Stems, and 
Stalks. 
Salts. 
Belladonna ( Atropa Bellcid.) 
Highly manured. 
s ^ 
} berries. 
| 4-3 
3-8 
12*0 
Same, under ordinary culti¬ 
vation . 
f 4-5 
X berries. 
} 4-0 
3-0 
8-7 
Foxglove ( Digitalis purpurea). 
Wild. 
9-2 
9-0 
8-0 
10-0 
Same, transplanted to a rich 
soil, manured slightly . . 
10T 
8-6 
8-0 
14-0 
Stramonium ( Datura Stramon .) 
Self-sown from cultivated 
3-0 T 
without > 
2-9 
2-0 
f 2-9 
< seeds and seed- 
plants. 
Same, under cultivation . . 
pericarp .) 
f 3-0 
without 
| 2 '° 
2-5 
C vessels. 
( 3-9 
■< seeds and seed- 
Henbane ( Ugoscyamus niger ) j 
C pericarp. 
4-0 
r 3 -g 
3-0 
t vessels. 
12-0 
Cultivated. J 
\ before 
flowering. 
leaves and stem?. 
Hemlock (Comum maculatum ) 
Wild. 
6-0 
6*0 
4-8 
not determined. 
Dulcamara ( Solarium Dulcam.) 
Wild. 
7-2 
G-0 
G-0 
variable. 
I 
Ripe 
berries. 
The effects produced by situation are of very great importance; a proper 
supply ot air and moisture should form the first consideration for oil-yielding 
* this principle, I find, exists m the seeds of all plants on which I have operated: it differs 
horn chlorophyll, first, in. its solutions not becoming yellow on exposure to the mr and 
secondly, its insolubility m hydrochloric acid. It may be isolated by digesting the alcoholic 
extract m a mixture of hydrochloric acid and ether, and separating the supernatant solution 
and allowing it to evaporate spontaneously. It then remains as a soft, oily substance possess¬ 
ing the odour of the plant from which it is extracted. 5 possess 
M. Iremy has announced to the Academy of Sciences that he has found a substance in the 
leaves of plants which lie regards as a modification of chlorophyll, and from its general proper¬ 
ties I am inclined to think that it is identical with what I have found in the seeds and seed- 
regard tofeateT'* 811117 perf ° rmS a dlfferent function here to that suggested by M. Fremy with 
