Am'/a0nu^887!arm'  }  Mayer' Ks  Reagent  for  Estimating  Alkaloids.  7 
The  practical  objection  to  this  procedure  is  that  it  requires  the  ope- 
rator to  provide  a  standard  solution  of  strychnine,1  which  will  take 
some  extra  time  and  labor  to  prepare,  and  which  will,  perhaps,  change 
with  time,  necessitating  frequent  re-examination  after  it  is  prepared. 
For  the  pharmacist  I  certainly  should  not  recommend  the  method, 
while  the  professional  chemist  will  object  that  it  is  lacking  in  precision. 
In  my  former  experiments  upon  the  pure  alkaloids,  I  estimated 
excess  by  a  very  simple  colorimetric  method,  as  follows  :  I  diluted 
1  cc.  of  the  Mayer's  reagent  N  1 : 20  to  200  cc.  with  distilled  water, 
placed  10  cc.  of  the  dilute  fluid  in  a  tube  of  white  glass,  added  a 
small  drop  of  ammonium  sulphide,  and  then  diluted  portions  of  the 
filtered  fluid  in  which  I  wished  to  estimate  excess,  until  10  cc.  treated 
in  a  similar  manner  gave  a  fluid  of  the  same  shade  of  color,  a  pale 
golden  brown.  Suppose  the  whole  volume  of  fluid  at  the  close  of 
the  titration  were  12  cc.  A  portion  of  this  fluid,  diluted  with  4J- 
times  its  volume  of  water,  gives  a  color  identical  with  that  of  my 
standard.    Then,  12X41-^200=0.27  will  be  the  excess  sought. 
It  will  be  seen  at  once  that  this  plan  is  applicable  only  in  titrations 
of  colorless,  or  nearly  colorless  fluids.  I  have  at  present  no  further 
suggestion  to  offer  in  this  direction,  but  there  should  be  no  difficulty 
in  devising  some  simple  plan  for  making  this  estimation  of  excess 
volumetrically. 
The  work  I  have  done,  it  will  be  readily  seen,  is  after  all  of  a  pre- 
liminary character.  In  some  of  it  I  have  doubtless  been  anticipated 
by  others,  whose  results  I  have  not  been  fortunate  enough  to  have 
met  with.  I  trust,  however,  that  on  the  foundation  that  is  afforded 
by  the  body  of  observations  to  which  these  hereinbefore  recorded  are 
a  contribution,  there  will  ultimately  be  built  structures  of  analy- 
tical methods  that  will  be  able  to  withstand  all  storms  of  adverse 
criticism. 
Detroit,  Mich.,  Nov.  16,  1886. 
Poisoning1  from  sorrel.-A  fatal  case  of  poisoning  is  reported  in  Hospital 
Gazette,  June  19, 1886.  A  boy  five  years  of  age  ate  a  quantity  of  fresh  sorrel, 
Rumex  Acetosa.  Lin.,  and  subsequently  to  quench  the  thirst  drank  of  soapy 
water  within  his  reach.  The  decomposition  of  the  soap  by  the  acid  oxalate 
of  the  sorrel  resulted  in  the  production  of  a  freely  soluble  salt  by  the  absorp- 
tion of  which  the  fatal  event  was  hastened. 
iThe  strychnine  solution,  to  correspond  with  a  reagent  N  1-20  should  contain  in  each  cc 
-ahout  8'5  mg.  strychnine. 
