414 POISONS : THEIR EFFECTS AND DETECTION. [§§ 49 I- 493 . 
if the acid is warmed, and is permanent. The solution becomes 
fluorescent if two drops of acetic acid are added. 
If a small quantity of commercial veratrine is added to melted oxalic 
acid and the warming continued, a blood-red colour is obtained. 
Veratrine, warmed with syrupy phosphoric acid, develops an odour 
of butyric acid. 
A dark green colour, followed by reddish-purple and blue colours, is 
obtained by adding a sprinkling of finely powdered sugar to a solution 
of veratrine in sulphuric acid. This is best seen with a solution of 
1 to 10,000 ; if in dilution of 1 to 100,000 a grass-green colour is pro¬ 
duced, followed by purple and blue colours, quickly changing to brown 
or black. 1 
When two or three drops of sulphuric acid and furfuraldehyde 
(5 drops to 10 c.c. of acid) are added to minute particles of alkaloids, a 
more or less characteristic colour makes its appearance ; this is parti¬ 
cularly the case with veratrine. A few particles rubbed with a glass 
rod, and moistened with the reagent, gives first a yellowish-green, then 
an olive-green mixture, the edges afterwards becoming a beautiful blue. 
On warming, the mixture gradually acquires a purple-violet colour. The 
blue substance obtained in the cold is insoluble in alcohol, ether, or 
chloroform. The least amount of water decolorises the solution, and, 
on adding much water, a fairly permanent yellow solution is obtained. 2 
§ 491. Pharmaceutical Preparations. —The alkaloid is official in 
the English, American, and Continental pharmacopoeias. There is also 
an unguentum veratrinw —strength about 1-8 per cent. In the London 
Pharmacopoeia of 1851 there used to be a wine of white veratrum, the 
active principle of 20 parts of the root by weight being contained in 
100 parts by measure of the wine. Such a wine would contain about 
0-084 per cent, of total alkaloids. Of the green veratrum there is a 
tincture ( tinctura veratri viridis), to make which 4 parts by weight 
of the root are exhausted by 20 parts by measure of spirits ; the strength 
varies, but the average is 0-02 per cent, of total alkaloids. 
§ 492. Fatal Dose. —The maximum dose of the commercial alkaloid 
is laid down as 10 mgrms. (-15 grain), which can be taken safely in a 
single dose, but nothing sufficiently definite is known as to what is a 
lethal dose. 1-3 grm. of the powdered rhizome has caused death, and, 
on the other hand, ten times that quantity has been taken with impunity, 
so that at present it is quite an open question. 
§ 493. Effects on Animals—Physiological Action. —Experiments on 
animals have proved that the veratrums act on the sensory nerves of 
the skin, and those of the mucous membranes of the nose and intestinal 
canal ; they are first excited, afterwards paralysed. When administered 
1 Fliickiger’s Reactions, 1893. 
2 A. Wender, Chem. Zeitung, xvii. 950, 951. 
