424 POISONS : THEIR EFFECTS AND DETECTION. [§ 511. 
a blue colour to the chloroform (Helch). Solid pilocarpine gives a blue 
colour with sulphuric acid. 
Hydrochloride of pilocarpine, treated on a glass slide with a minute 
crystal of potassium ferrocyanide, and moistened with a drop of water, 
is coloured intensely yellow; on evaporating to dryness, and adding a 
drop of hydrochloric acid, the yellow residue turns bluish-white ; on 
again drying, and moistening with sulphuric acid, a sky-blue coloration 
is obtained. In concentrated solution picric acid forms bushes of needles 
or rosettes, and may be identified by its melting-point, 159°-160°. 
Trinitro-resorcin gives after a time long crystals. 
Behrens recommends the following micro-test:—A droplet of the 
dilute hydrochloride solution is evaporated on a glass slide until a ring 
just visible results. This is moistened with an equally small drop of a 
solution of sodium iod-platinate. Small crystals immediately result, in 
the form of branched rosettes, in transmitted light beautifully dark 
green, and in reflected light red with a metallic lustre. 
If pilocarpine is mixed with quinine, it has been suggested to precipi¬ 
tate the weakly acid solution with potassic dichromate and extract the 
chromate of quinine with chloroform, in which it is soluble. Under 
these circumstances, pilocarpine remains in the aqueous layer (Meillere, 
Journ. Pharm. Chem., 1912). Pilocarpine may be extracted from an 
aqueous solution made alkaline by ammonia and shaken up with 
benzene or chloroform. 
§ 511. Effects. —Pilocarpine, given subcutaneously in doses of about 
32 mgrms. (J grain), causes within five minutes a profuse perspiration 
and salivation, the face becomes flushed, and the whole body sweats ; 
at the same time, the buccal secretion is so much increased that in a 
few hours over a pint may be secreted. The tears, the bronchial 
secretion, and the intestinal secretions are also augmented ; there are 
generally headache and a frequent desire to pass water ; the pulse is 
much quickened, and the temperature falls from 14° to 4° : the 
symptoms last from two to five hours. Langley has shown that the 
over-action of the submaxillary gland is not affected by section either 
of the chorda tympani or of the sympathetic supplying the gland. 
Although pilocarpine quickens the pulse of man, it slows, according to 
Langley, 1 the heart of the warm-blooded animals, and that of the frog. 
With regard to the frog, Dr S. Ringer’s researches are confirmatory. 
With large doses the heart stops in diastole. If to the heart thus slowed, 
or even when recently stopped, a minute quantity of atropine be 
applied, it begins to beat again. There is also a most complete anta¬ 
gonism between atropine and pilocarpine in other respects, atropine 
stopping the excessive perspiration, and relieving the headache and 
The Action of Jaborandi on the Heart,” by J. N. Langley, B.A., Journ. Anat. 
and Physiol., x. 187. 
