THE 
VETERINARIAN. 
VOL. XLII. 
No. 502. 
OCTOBER, 1869. 
Fourth Series. 
No. 178. 
Communications and Cases. 
OBSERVATIONS ON STRYCHNIA. 
By Professor Tuson, Royal Veterinary College. 
In a former number of this Journal I briefly described one 
of the methods by which strychnia is obtained from its most 
common source, namely, nux vomica. By the process here 
referred to the alkaloid is procured in prismatic crystals vary¬ 
ing in length from one sixteenth to half an inch. In this state 
strychnia is usually supplied to the medical practitioner and 
druggist, although an apparently amorphous preparation is 
frequently met with in medicine termed precipitated strych¬ 
nia.” This agent is obtained by adding ammonia to a solu¬ 
tion of sulphate of strychnia, whereby the alkaloid is thrown 
down as a precipitate, which, when examined by a low power 
of the microscope, is found to consist of minute, slender 
prismatic crystals. Strychnia, obtained by either process, 
possesses the following additional qualities by which it may 
be identified and distinguished from all other bodies with 
which we are at present acquainted:— 
1. Heated in a hard-glass test-tube it fuses, decomposes, 
and yields, besides other products, ammonia, which can he 
detected by introducing into the upper part of the tube a glass 
rod moistened with hydrochloric acid, when dense white fumes 
of ammonium chloride are seen to form. 
2 . It is white, and when hoiled with distilled water does 
not apparently dissolve. That the water has, however, 
exerted some solvent power upon the strychnia, can be easily 
xLii. 49 
