462 
PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY, EDINBURGH. 
The fourth meeting of the present session was held in St. George’s Hall on the eve¬ 
ning of Tuesday, 14th current, at 9 o’clock ; Mr. Kemp, President, in the chair. 
After a few preliminary remarks by the Chairman, the following communications 
were made:— 
1. Notes on a New Species of Gall from China, with references to other unusual 
Commercial Galls, by Professor Archer, of the Industrial Museum. 
Since the greatly increased demand for gallic acid which has been caused by the 
requirements of photographic chemistry, much interest has been felt in obtaining galls 
from various parts of the world from which to procure that acid. One of the first new 
products of this class was the Chinese gall, described by Dr. Pereira in the £ Pharma¬ 
ceutical Journal,’ vol. iv. p. 384, 1844, under the name of Woo-pei-tsze. These have 
now become regular articles of commerce, and so also has a similar one obtained in 
Japan, rather smaller but apparently produced on the same tree, or a closely allied 
species. Mr. Daniel Hanbury, who has carefully examined the Chinese galls, is of 
opinion that they are produced on Rhus semi-alata , and Mr. Doubleday, the entomologist, 
has shown that they are caused by an aphis and not by a cynips, as in the case of most 
other galls with which we are acquainted. 
Next came a small gall from India, called by its Indian name Mahee, this is yielded 
by two species of Tamarisk ( Tamarix vndica and T. furas ); they are very rich in gallic 
acid, but are not procurable in very large quantities. The shrub, however, grows in 
Algiers, and there it appears to yield the galls more abundantly, as very considerable 
quantities are exported to France under their Moorish name Takaout. There is a curious 
gall, shaped somewhat like an ox horn, and about two inches or two and half inches in 
length, which has a commercial value in India but has not yet found its way into our 
markets, it is called Kakarasinghee or Kakrasingee, and is produced on Rhus Kakra- 
singhee (Royle); they are to a small extent used by the Indian tanners, and have also a 
place in the Materia Medica of India, possibly ere long they may become articles of im¬ 
port into this country. 
The gall most extensively used in Southern Germany is the curious Knoppern, pro¬ 
duced by the puncture of a species of Cynips on an oak-tree, Quercus Cerris. These 
have been imported occasionally, but are very inferior in quality to the common Turkish 
galls. In Italy, France, Turkey, and India, the galls formed on several species of Pis¬ 
tachio, as Pistacia vera, P. lentiscus, etc. are used, and those fromP. lentiscus are largely 
used for tanning in Turkey and Italy. Their value is not known in this country. 
The latest novelty is a very curious gall which I have just received as an import from 
Shanghae; it bears strong resemblances to the Chinese and Japanese galls, but has not 
their peculiar branched appearance; on the contrary, it has mostly the form of a radish- 
pod, and although some are slightly tomentose, as in the case of the other two, yet most 
of them are smooth ; here and there we find amongst them some which have a tendency 
to the branched form, indeed these galls seem to be intermediate in their general cha¬ 
racteristics between the Kakarasinghee and the Woo-pei-tsze. They were lately imported 
into Liverpool, and doubtless will soon become common. 
2. Note on a New Article of Commerce, called Cape Saffron, by Professor Archer. 
This remarkable product, which strikingly resembles saffron in all but its colour, is 
the dried flower of a very small plant extremely common in some parts of the Cape of 
Good Hope, takiug there the place of our common Toadflax, Linaria vulgaris , and be- 
loaging to the same Natural Order, Scrophulariaceas. It yields a colour like that of 
saffron, and, what is very remarkable, it yields it as readily when mixed even with cold 
water, moreover its odour is that of good saffron, and equally strong; two importations 
have taken place, the first about five years since, which was only a small sample, the 
latter about 70 lb. weight; the former shared the fate of thousands of valuable pro¬ 
ducts, it was buried in a drug-broker’s drawer, the latter is in the hands of an intelligent 
merchant, Mr. David Bain, 50, Stanhope Street, Hampstead Road, London, who is fully 
alive to the value of bringing forward the economic products of the Cape. Dr. Pappe 
smce called attention to the uses of this plant, and the following quotation is from 
his ‘Florae Capensis Medicae Prodromus:’— 
