406 poisons : their effects and detection. [§§ 477, 478. 
poisoning by the same substance. The most constant phenomena are a quick pulse, 
laboured respiration, great restlessness, and hyperaesthesia of the skin. Albumen 
in the urine is common. Nervous symptoms, such as convulsions, aphasia, delirium, 
and even catalepsy, have been witnessed. In some cases there have been the 
symptoms of irritant poison—diarrhoea, vomiting, and pain in the bowels : in many 
cases dilatation of the pupil has been observed. 
Rabbits are killed by doses of OT grm. per kilo. The symptoms commence in 
about ten minutes after the administration, and consist of apathy and a low tem¬ 
perature ; the breathing is much slowed. Convulsions set in suddenly before death, 
and the pupils become dilated. The post-mortem appearances in animals are intense 
redness and injection of the meninges of the cerebellum, of the medulla oblongata, 
and of the spinal cord. Dark red blood is found in the heart, and the kidneys are 
hypersemic. The intestinal mucous membrane is normal. 
§ 477. Separation of Solanine from the Tissues of the Body —Dragendorff has 
proved the possibility of separating solanine from animal tissues by extracting it from 
a poisoned pig. The best plan seems to be to extract with cold dilute sulphuric acid 
water, which is then made alkaline by ammonia, and shaken up with warm amyl 
alcohol. This readily dissolves any solanine. The peculiar property possessed by 
the alkaloid of gelatinising, and the play of colours with Frohde’s reagent, may then 
be essayed on the solanine thus separated. 
4. CYTISINE. 
§ 478. The Cytisus Laburnum. — The laburnum tree, Cytisus 
laburnum, so common in shrubberies, is intensely poisonous. The 
flowers, bark, wood, seeds, and the root have all caused serious 
symptoms. The active principle is an alkaloid, to which the name of 
Cytisine has been given. Cytisine has alsjo been found in many plants 
belonging to the Leguminosese, such as Ulex europceus, Sophora tomentosa 
and speciosa, Baptisia tinctoria, etc. The best source is the seeds of 
laburnum. The seeds are powdered and extracted with alcohol con¬ 
taining hydrochloric acid, the alcohol distilled off, the residue treated 
with water and filtered through a wet filter to remove any fatty oil, 
the filtrate treated with lead acetate ; and, after separating the pre¬ 
cipitated colouring-matter, made alkaline with caustic potash, and 
shaken with amyl alcohol. The amyl alcohol is shaken with dilute 
hydrochloric acid, the solution evaporated, the crude crystals of 
hydrochloride thus obtained treated with alcohol to remove colouring- 
matters, and recrystallised several times from water ; it then forms 
well-developed, colourless, transparent prisms. From the hydrochloride 
the free base is readily obtained. 
Cytisine, C n H 14 N 2 0.—To cytisine used to be ascribed the formula 
C 20 H 27 N 3 O, but a study of the salt and new determinations appear to 
prove that it is identical with ulexine. Cytisine is in the form of white 
radiating crystals, consisting, when deposited from absolute alcohol, of 
anhydrous prisms, which melt at from 152° to 153°. Cytisine has a 
strong alkaline reaction ; it is soluble in water, alcohol, and chloroform, 
less so in benzene and amyl alcohol, almost insoluble in cold light 
petroleum, and insoluble in pure ether. The specific rotatory power in 
solution is [a] D 17°=—119*57. 
