549 
PREPARATION OF LIQ. FEH1U PEllCHLOlt., P.B. 
ing above 100 species. I liave collected in the Argentine Provinces up to this date eight 
species, of which only three were previously known. I shall confine myself to naming 
these three, which are:— 
Cantharis cidspersa (Lytta adspersa, Kh/g, Nova Acad. C.L. C.Ac., vol. xii.pl. 2, 
p. 434, t. 25).—it is this species which is known here as the Bicho mono, and is so abun¬ 
dant in our gardens, where it does great damage by eating seedling plants. I have found 
it also in the Banda Oriental and in the province of Mendoza. 
Cantharis punctata (Lytta punctata, German, Spec. Insect. Nov. i. 175, 287).—Very 
like the Bicho mono ; but the elytra are more strongly marked with black dots, and the 
feet are of the same brownish black as the rest of the body. I have found this in the 
Banda Oriental, and in Entre-Rios near the Parana. 
Cantharis vittigera (Pyrota vittigera, Bl., D' Orbigny, Voy. Entom. 200, t. 15, f. 7).— 
Collected on the Parana. 
The last of these three species is naked on the surface; the other two have a very fine 
brown pubescence, with naked points. The remaining species are clothed in the same 
way, except one very small one from the Banda Oriental, and another very large one 
from Catamarca and Mendoza, and probably along the whole western side of the Re¬ 
public (La Rioja, San Juan) at the foot of the Cordillera. This species, which I call 
Cantharis viridipennis , is one of the largest of all, being nearly an inch long, of a 
black colour, with yellow feet, and metallic-green elytra. It is probably also the most 
efficacious of the Argentine species, being the only one that has a metallic lustre, like 
the European species. The apothecaries of Mendoza employ it with very good effect. 
4. Nemognatha, Illig.—This genus is easily distinguished by the prolongation of the 
lower mandible into a longish thread. I have one species, hitherto unknown, of a 
yellow colour, with black antenna? and tibiae, from the Parana. I shall call it N. 
nigricornis. 
ON THE PREPARATION OE LIQ. EERRI PERCHLOR., P.B. 
BY WILLIAM JAKDINE. 
(Read before the Glasgow Chemists and Druggists Association, February 1 Gth, 1865.) 
About a year ago, when the tide of critical opinion anent the new Pharma¬ 
copoeia ran high, I was induced to turn my attention to the process which it 
gave for the preparation of the Tinct. Eerri Perchlor., from the very adverse 
criticism with which that particular process had been assailed. During the 
discussion after the reading of Dr. James Morton’s paper in the Hall of the 
Association Athenaeum, several gentlemen expressed themselves in very decided 
terms as to the merits or demerits of the process. They had almost all obtained 
a product as black as ink, with a suffocating odour of nitrous acid, and which, 
when mixed with spirit, produced a tincture having the appearance of ink and 
water, and which in a few days deposited a copious sediment of basic perchloride 
of iron. One gentleman said, that in conducting the evaporation by the naked 
flame, he had made a mess of it, but had succeeded very well by using the 
water-bath ; another said he had obtained a very fair product, but that it and 
the spirit fell out before they were a week together, and the iron, with a 
modesty more becoming than convenient, retired to the bottom of the bottle; 
while a third extinguished the discussion by declaring that it was a “ beastly 
preparation.” These expressions of opinion, together with the circumstance 
that I never had been satisfied with the tincture of steel prepared in the old 
way, induced me to give the British Pharmacopoeia process a fair trial, con¬ 
vinced beforehand that the product could not be much more unsatisfactory than 
the extremely acid and inconstant preparation obtained by dissolving sesqui- 
oxide of iron in hydrochloric acid. I will now give you the results of my 
experiments. 
