r 
—15.— 
“Any person who shall dig up, not less than three inches below the surface of 
the ground, any loco or poison weed during the months of May, June or July, 
ehall receive a premium of 1% cents per pound for each pound of such weed dug 
up, to be paid out of the state treasury as hereinafter provided; provided, that such 
weed shall not be weighed in a green state, but shall be thoroughly dried and 
weighed.” 
On writing to Hon. W. H. Brisbane, State Treasurer, I re¬ 
ceived the following reply : 
OFFICE OF 
STATE TREASURER, 
W. H. Brisbane, Trcas. 
Denver, Colo., May 30, 1890. 
Prof^ David 0"'Brine, Fort Collins, Colo.: 
Dear Sir. —The State has paid out in bounties on loco weed nearly $200,000. 
The law was repealed April, 1885. I should like to know your conclusions when 
finished. Yours truly, 
W. H. Brisbane, 
State Treasurer. 
On examining the statute, we find the law was passed 
March 14, 1881, and repealed February 18, 1885. It cost the 
State $50,000 a year for bounty. 
The plants that we examined on this occasion were 
identified by Professor Cassidy and later by Professor 
Crandall. They were dried, ground and sifted, and treated 
first by the Dragendorff method. The method is de¬ 
scribed in his work on plant analysis, 1884, published by J. H. 
Vail & Co., New York, or in Wharton and Stille’s Medical 
Jurisprudence, Vol. II. on poisons, page 356, § 348. It has 
been thought too technical to be inserted here. In every in¬ 
stance I failed to get anything that would crystallize, only a 
gummy extract, that gave reactions with Wagner’s reagent 
(iodine in potassium iodide solution), with Mayer’s (potas¬ 
sium mercuric iodide), with Sonnenschein’s (phosphomolyb- 
date), with Marme’s (potassium cadmium iodide), with Drag- 
endorff’s (potassium bismuth iodide), with Hager’s (picric 
acid), with Schibler’s (Metatungstic acid), with Berzelius’ 
(tannic acid) and also with the chlorides of platinum and 
gold. Their general action was reducing; when ammonium 
molybdate was dissolved in strong sulphuric acid it acted like 
morphine, reduced it to a sapphire blue (Froehde’s reagent); 
with iodic anhydride and bisulphide of carbon free iodine 
was liberated. These reactions were tried from the chloro¬ 
form, ether and absolute alcohol extracts, and it seemed to 
make but little difference which was used, or whether the ex¬ 
tract came from an acid or an alkaline solution. After I had 
thoroughly tried the reaction, I tried alfalfa, treated identi- 
