Adulteration of Beeswax . 
dron; and so the word is adopted by Poppig and Endlicher,* Lindley in 
his Vegetable Kingdom (1853), Eichler in the Flora Brasiliensis of Mar- 
tius, Bentham and Hookerf* (1862), and, lastly, by Baillon in his Histoir? 
des Plantes\ (1871). 
With the sanction of such an overwhelming amount of authority, I 
am satisfied to accept the name without any attempt at improvement. It 
has served for eighty years in botanical literature, and may fairly claim 
admittance to that of pharmacy.— London Pharm. Journal. 
ADULTERATION OF BEESWAX.|| 
BY ADOLPH W. MILLER, M. D., PH. D. 
For a year or two past there has been offered in this market, and most 
probably elsewhere, an article termed “refined beeswax.” It is unusually 
handsome in appearance and is generally represented as being strictly 
pure. It may be known by all of it being of a uniform bright-yellow 
color, entirely free from the sedimentary stratum of impurities ordinarily 
found in country wax. Its surface is clean and glossy, having no foreign 
particles adhering to it. On account of these apparent merits, it is usually 
sold at an advance on the price of the regular article. All of this so-called 
refined beeswax, so far met with, had been moulded into the shape of ob¬ 
long blocks of uniformjaize,--measuring about fourteen inches in length,, 
eight in width and^f^r^ tapering slightly upwards, and 
weighing about ei/nt p^unds-o%^n^arera^e. 
The melting point of the refined wax Was found to be 146° F., that' 
of pure wax beinfrom 137 0 to 140°. Its speci¬ 
fic gravity is -929, placingit again intermediate between beeswax, *963, 
and paraffin, *871. BeW SSmfe ^to suspect the presence of the latter 
body, 100 grains of the refined article were heated for fifteen or twenty 
minutes with one ounce of sulphuric acid to about 350° F.; several ounces 
of water were then added, and after cooling a sheet of paraffin weighing- 
80 grains was obtained, the loss representing the beeswax which had been, 
carbonized by the acid. In order to verify the experiment, it was repeated 
with a composition of four parts paraffin to one of wax, when analogous 
results were obtained. 100 grains of pure paraffin, treated in the same 
manner, were recovered unchanged. 
All the best text-books recommend fuming Nordhausen acid for this 
purpose, and state that an allowance must be made for a portion of paraffin 
charred by this acid. No one seems to have previously tried the or¬ 
dinary commercial sulphuric acid, which was really found to be better 
adapted than the Nordhausen, as all the wax was carbonized and none of 
the paraffin affected. 
The test is very readily applied, the only difficulty, and this a very 
trivial one, being the separation of the carbonaceous matter from the 
Botanical 
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