LACTUCARIUM  AND  ITS  PREPARATIONS.  229 
boiling  water  to  constitute  with  the  proper  proportion  of  sugar, 
a  pint  of  syrup:  this  is  then  flavored  with  distilled  orange  flower 
water,  and  directed  as  an  adjuvant  in  expectorant  and  numerous 
other  mixtures,  or  given  alone  in  doses  of  a  teaspoonful.  To 
this  very  popular  remedy  there  are  two  objections,  it  is  too  weak 
and  not  sufficiently  uniform,  though  very  agreeable  and  much 
prescribed  by  some  of  the  most  successful  practitioners. 
Having  often  had  occasion  to  make  this  syrup  in  considerable 
quantities,  we  notice  that  there  is  always  a  portion  of  undissolved 
extract,  even  when  we  have  taken  the  precaution  to  add  the  hot 
syrup  to  the  mixed  acid  and  extract,  a  precaution  which  favors 
its  complete  solution.  A  carefully  performed  experiment  with 
hydro-alcoholic  extract  treated  with  the  acid  and  boiling  water, 
as  directed  by  Aubergier,  left  just  one-third  the  weight  of  the 
extract  undissolved;  this  portion  was  intensely  bitter,  and  yielded 
40  per  cent,  of  its  weight  to  strong  alcohol,  the  exhausted  dregs  re- 
maining were  somewhat  crystalline,  but  insoluble  and  apparently 
inert. 
Convinced  by  our  experiments  that  diluted  alcohol  is  the  very 
best  solvent  for  this  drug,  an  opinion  which  accords  with  that 
of  Aubergier,  and  that  an  extract  whether  made  with  this 
solvent  or  with  stronger  alcohol  becomes  partially  insolubje  by 
inspissation  to  the  solid  consistence  and  is  hence  unsuited  to  make 
the  fluid  preparations  required,  we  have  found  the  most 
economical  and  efficient  treatment  to  be  that  which  thoroughly 
exhausts  the  drug,  whether  English  or  German,  by  diluted  alco- 
hol and  arrests  the  evaporation  at  such  point  as  to  make  each 
fluid-ounce  equal  to  a  weighed  officinal  ounce  of  the  drug.  The 
fact  of  the  comparative  insolubility  of  the  active  principles 
in  aqueous  menstrua  makes  it  necessary  to  add  alcohol  toward 
the  close  of  this  evaporation,  or  rather  to  separate  the  resinoid 
deposit  (which  in  the  German  has  a  light  brown  color,  but  in 
the  English  is  black,)  and  by  trituration  with  strong  alcohol  to 
produce  a  complete  solution  before  the  quantity  of  resulting  fluid 
extract  is  finally  reached  ;  the  fluid  extract  as  thus  prepared  is 
black  and  intensely  bitter,  with  a  heavy  narcotic  odor .  Any 
other  forms  of  preparation  which  may  be  prescribed  can  be  con- 
veniently made  of  this  fluid  extract. 
A  tincture  may  be  made  by  mixing  two  parts  of  fluid  extract 
