ATROPINE j DATURINE, AND ACONITINE. 
39 
needles ; it was heavier than water, not altered by exposure to the 
air, perfectly free from smell, and scarcely soluble in water. It 
dissolved more readily in alcohol than in ether, but in both liquids 
its solubility was increased by heat. At 190° F. it melts without 
decreasing in weight; on cooling, it furnishes, like atropine, a 
brittle, colourless, transparent mass, which at a higher tempera- 
ture is partially volatilized unaltered. It melts upon platinum, 
puffs up, giving off white vapours, and burns with a bright lumin- 
ous flame, leaving a shining black cinder, which at last entirely 
disappears. 
Daturine has a strong alkaline reaction, and forms salts with acids. 
In the present case it was likewise found impossible to obtain 
the sulphate and muriate crystallized. They are both readily solu- 
ble in water and in alcohol. The muriate of daturine furnishes 
pulverulent precipitates with potash, ammonia and carbon of potash, 
but only with concentrated solutions ; the precipitates dissolve 
easily in an excess of the reagent. Carbonate of ammonia, bicar- 
bonate and phosphate of soda give no precipitate ; perchloride of 
gold produces a sulphur-coloured crystalline precipitate, which is 
slightly soluble in muriatic acid; chloride of platinum, with very 
concentrated solutions, gives a precipitate, which is at first pulveru- 
lent, but soon cakes together like a resin, and then no longer dis- 
solves so readily in muriatic acid. Perchloride of mercury pro- 
duces a white pulverulent precipitate only in very strong solutions ; 
it is readily soluble in muriatic acid and in chloride of ammonium; 
no precipitate is produced by sulphocyanide of potassium ; tincture 
of iodine gives a kermes-coloured flocculent precipitate, which soon 
turns blackish-blue ; tincture of galls and tannic acid cause a copi- 
ous precipitate only on the addition of muriatic acid ; that produced 
by the first reagent dissolves with difficulty in the excess of muri- 
atic acid; that by the second, readily. Nitropicric acid furnishes 
a yellow precipitate, which is easily soluble in ammonia. 
The daturine for analysis was dried under the air-pump ; the re- 
sults do not agree perfectly with the calculation, owing to the pre- 
sence of a little impurity, which was subsequently detected. An 
average of three analysis gives Carbon 69.30, Hydrogen 8.09, Ni- 
trogen 4.94, Oxygen 17.75, represented by C 34 H 23 N0 6 — 289. 
Aconitine. — The aconitine employed in this investigation, after 
being purified by the author, formed a colourless powder, without 
