74 
Gleanings  in  Materia  Medica. 
Am.  Jour.  Pbarm, 
Feb.,  1887. 
of  the  claws  of  the  petals ;  and  it  has  been  detected  also  in  a  number 
of  other  plants,  both  monocotyledons  and  dicotyledons.  It  is  soluble 
in  water  and  alcohol,  less  soluble  in  absolute  alcohol,  and  with  difficul- 
ty only  in  ether,  benzol  and  chloroform.  It  is  rapidly  extracted  by 
acids  and  alkalies,  crystallizes  in  yellowish  sphsero-crystals  and  forms,, 
with  water,  blue  acicular  crystals  and  an  amorphous  compound.  This 
"  soluble  starch  "  is  not  a  tannin  as  supposed  by  Kraus,  nor  an  albu- 
minoid as  suggested  by  Nageli ;  neither  is  it  a  carbohydrate  analogous 
to  ordinary  starch. 
Coniferin. — Hans  Molisch  (Ber.  D.  Botan.  Ges.  1886,  p.  301— 
305)  recommends  a  reagent  prepared  by  diluting  a  20  per  cent,  thymol 
solution  in  absolute  alcohol  with  water  as  long  as  it  remains  clear,  ad- 
ding excess  of  potassium  chlorate,  and  filtering  after  several  hours. 
On  moistening  lignified  tissue  with  this  liquid  and  then  adding  a  drop 
of  concentrated  hydrochloric  acid  a  blue-green  color  is  produced  in  a 
few  seconds  even  in  the  dark.  In  this  respect  it  is  preferable  to  Tie- 
mann  and  Haarmann's  reagent  (1874)  which  succeeds  best  in  direct  sun- 
light, a  yellowish-green,  blue-green  or  sky-blue  color  being  produced 
by  phenol  and  hydrochloric  acid. 
The  reaction  is  readily  obtained  with  wood-pulp  paper,  and  over 
one  hundred  herbaceous  and  woody  plants  which  were  tested,  yielded 
the  coloration,  which  appeared  only  in  the  lignified  cells,  notably  in 
the  cell-walls  of  the  wood,  then  in  the  pith  and  bast  cells.  The  col- 
oration is  not  always  alike  in  intensity  which  is  doubtless  due  to  the 
variable  proportion  of  coniferin,  and  it  is  in  some  cases  masked  to  a 
certain  degree  by  the  presence  of  phloroglucin,  which  with  hydrochlo- 
ric acid,  is  Wiesner's  (1878)  test  for  lignin,  a  reddish  violet  color  being^ 
the  result. 
Pure  coniferin  gives  only  a  faint  reaction  with  the  reagent.  The 
cause  of  the  intensity  of  the  color  in  lignified  tissue  has  not  been  de- 
termined. Vanillin  always  accompanies  lignin  ;  but  Swedish  filtering 
paper,  soaked  in  a  solution  of  coniferin  and  after  drying,  moistened 
with  a  solution  of  gum  or  of  vanillin,  yielded  with  the  reagent  no 
color  or  only  a  faint  one.  Tannin,  oil  of  turpentine  and  fresh  vegeta- 
ble extract  did  likewise  not  further  the  reaction. 
A  blue  color  with  coniferin,  but  likewise  with  vanillin,  is  also  pro- 
duced by  a  naphthol  and  hydrochloric  acid. 
The  U.  S.  P.  process  for  assaying  opium  has  been  studied  by  T.  J. 
Wrampelmeier  and  G.  Meinert,  the  results  being  communicated  in  a 
