February 10,1872.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
G53 
There would he no deposition of crystalline matter, 
because there was present a menstruum (the spirit) 
which, as the benzoic acid formed, dissolved it. That 
seemed to him to be a somewhat analogous case to what 
possibly occurred in tincture of cinnamon. It was most 
desirable that there should be some experiments to indi¬ 
cate whether decomposition took place when external 
evidences of it were absent. 
Mr. Greenish said that the cinnamon had absolutely 
gone out of the two preparations he had mentioned, or 
scarcely a trace of it was left, and, therefore, in the de¬ 
composition the cinnamon was evidently decomposed, 
and there was a very copious precipitate. When made 
with the stronger spirit, the compound tincture of cin¬ 
namon and the simple tincture had each a strong smell 
of cinnamon after having been kept for about two years. 
In every Pharmacopoeia which he had consulted on the 
subject, except that of the United States, a stronger 
spirit was used—either six of spirit to two of water, or 
rectified spirit. 
The Pkesidext asked Professor Redwood what method 
he would propose to be adopted for ascertaining at what 
time chemical change commenced in tincture of cinna¬ 
mon, and to what extent ? 
Professor Redwood said Mr. Greenish had just referred 
to one evidence which certainly went to show that the 
tincture made with the strong spirit had retained the 
cinnamon oil longer than the other, for the flavour of 
cinnamon still remained. What they would have to look 
for would undoubtedly be oil of cinnamon in the one 
case, and cinnamic acid in the other. As the oil of cin¬ 
namon disappeared, the cinnamic acid would be pro¬ 
duced. But it was not easy to judge of the propor¬ 
tion of an essential oil in) a strong solution of it, by 
the taste or smell. He had recently had evidence of this 
in the investigation of a subject allied to that before the 
meeting, and which he had intended alluding to in con¬ 
nection with the President’s paper submitted to them at 
the previous meeting. One of the subjects referred to 
in that paper was syrup of tolu; and it was stated that 
in making that preparation the tolu did not become com¬ 
pletely exhausted of the constituents which gave the 
peculiar character to the syrup. That was a subject of 
some importance to the pharmaceutist, and one, more¬ 
over, to wdiich he had directed his attention, indepen¬ 
dently of its being brought forward in the paper. He 
had been requested to examine a specimen of balsam of 
tolu for the purpose of ascertaining whether it was 
genuine or not. He found clearly that it consisted of 
the resinous matter of the balsam of tolu answering to 
the reactions which that resin would give, but it was 
deficient in some of the most important constituents of 
good balsam of tolu, namely, cinnamic acid and the pe¬ 
culiar oily matter which gave to balsam of tolu much of 
its peculiar flavour. He concluded that it was balsam 
of tolu which had been used for making syrup, or for 
some similar purpose. In compliance with a suggestion 
made by Sir. Hanbury, he had used some of this par¬ 
tially-exhausted balsam for making syrup of tolu accord¬ 
ing to the Pharmacopoeia, and compared the product with 
some syrup made with perfectly good and genuine balsam. 
Now, taking the syrups in the form in which he had pro¬ 
duced them, he did not find it very easy to distinguish the 
one from the other; but if half an ounce of each of those 
syrups were put into a bottle and diluted with eight or 
ten times its volume of water, there would be no difficulty 
in distinguishing between them,—one solution being 
poor and vapid compared with the other. He should 
test the tinctures in a somewhat similar way. In exa¬ 
mining the balsams, of course he should go to the quan¬ 
titative determination of the proportions of cinnamic 
acid in them, as there appeared a probability that ex¬ 
hausted balsam of tolu might find its way into commerce. 
It was quite clear that something more was required 
than was at present given in the Pharmacopoeia for the 
purpose of indicating what balsam of tolu ought to be. 
In the first volume of the Pharmaceutical Journal, Pro¬ 
fessor Soubeiran, of Paris, reported the results of experi¬ 
ments he had made in consequence of a statement that 
the same balsam of tolu might be used two or three times 
for making syrup without any deterioration in the quality 
ot the product. Soubeiran came to the conclusion that, 
taking account of the proportion of balsam of tolu which 
was ordered, it could be used twice without deterioration 
in the product, but not more than twice. The propor¬ 
tion then ordered in the Paris Codex was one part of 
balsam to four parts of water. It was evident from the 
experiments of Soubeiran that a smaller proportion would 
yield a syrup equally good, and the proportion in the 
Paris Codex has therefore been altered to one part of 
balsam to ten of water. The proportion prescribed in 
the British Pharmacopoeia is even-less, being one to about 
thirteen, while in Russia the proportion remains at one 
to four. Having reference to the quality of this syrup, 
we could neither diminish the proportion of balsam ordered 
in our Pharmacopoeia nor use exhausted balsam without 
injury to the product. There was a vast difference be¬ 
tween syrup of tolu prepared according to the Pharma¬ 
copoeia, and that which had been occasionally recom¬ 
mended, which was produced by putting tincture of tolu 
into ordinary syrup. Syrup of tolu, made according to 
the Pharmacopoeia, was one of the most elegant, agreeable 
and successful of our officinal syrups. It contained a 
considerable quantity of cinnamic acid, while it derived 
the flavour of the balsam from the oily and resinous 
matter. On every ground it was important to maintain 
the character of that syrup, aad in doing so those who 
made it must take care that they were not imposed upon 
with exhausted balsam. 
Mr. Mackay said that he would refer to the analogy 
wdiich Prof. Redwood had stated existed between tinc¬ 
ture of cinnamon, when kept for a considerable time, 
and the remarkable change wdiich took place in the oil 
of bitter almonds wdien freed from prussic acid and 
diluted with spirit. Some years ago a quantity of essen¬ 
tial oil of bitter almonds was accidentally sent out in 
small bottles by a celebrated house in England and dis¬ 
tributed throughout the length and breadth of the country 
under the name of “essence of bitter almonds,” and a 
portion of the oil so labelled came into his neighbour¬ 
hood and fell into the hands of an inquisitive servant 
girl, who swallowed fully a teaspoonful, the result being, 
he need scarcely add, fatal. The public mind then became- 
very much alarmed about the use of the essence of bitter 
almonds in any shape, and the consequence was that a 
great many persons wdio had been engaged previously in 
the manufacture of essence of bitter almonds, determined 
to make their preparation free from prussic acid. He wrns 
amongst the number who determined to do so, and dis¬ 
tilled very large quantities of the oil in the usual way over 
potash and lime, in which process, as a matter of course, 
he was successful in removing the prussic acid ; but the 
effect when this oil was diluted wdth spirit was very 
much what Prof. Redwmod had described: there was a 
considerable quantity of benzoic acid formed, more espe¬ 
cially if the bottle happened to be exposed to the sun¬ 
light. But then came the peculiarity wdiich he wished 
to notice, namely, that though there was a deposition 
sufficiently great to line the interior of the bottle wdth 
benzoic acid, there was not an absence of flavour. There 
was so much of the peculiar flavour of bitter almonds 
left that the compound was used freely for domestic 
purposes, and in the only cases in wdiich parties refused 
to use it, the refusal was due more to the unsightly ap¬ 
pearance of the liquid than to the positive absence of 
flavour. Now he was told by Mr. Greenish in reference 
to the decomposed tincture of cinnamon that the flavour 
of the cinnamon had been entirely destroyed. 
Mr. Greenish : Almost. 
Mr. Mackay : Well, that was not the case in the de¬ 
composed bitteyalmonds, and in that respect the analogy 
between the tw r o had failed. 
