354  Gleanings  from  the  French  Journals.    {Am'jiiyir  i£?arm' 
New  Coloring  for  Wine. — M.  Portes  is  reported  (Archiv.  de 
Phar.,  June),  as  showing  to  the  Society  de  Pharmacie  a  new  coloring 
material  for  wines,  sold  as  "  a  colorant  undiscoverable  by  chemists. " 
M.  Portes  found  it  to  consist  of  a  mixture  of  tropasoline,  sulphate  of 
fuchsine  and  indigo-carmine.  He  first  treated  the  coloring  substance 
with  boiling  amylic  alcohol  which  dissolved  the  tropseoline  ;  the 
residuum,  treated  with  alcohol,  dissolved  the  fuchsine,  and  the  final 
residuum  treated  with  water,  dissolved  the  indigo-carmine.  Wines 
colored  with  the  substance  show,  precisely  like  natural  wines,  a  green- 
ish reaction  when  treated  with  ammonia.  This  is  explained  by  the 
fact  that  the  reagent  bleaches  the  fuchsine,  leaving  the  blue  and  yel- 
low matters,  which  mixing  together  give  the  green  color..  The  color- 
ing substance  is  not  easy  to  detect  in  wine,  the  fuchsine  alone  being 
easily  separated. 
(The  following  are  from  a  report  by  Dr.  Zinowiew,  {Bull.  Gen.  de 
Therap.,  May  30.,)  of  the  proceedings  of  the  Second  Congress  of  Rus- 
sian Physicians  at  Moscow,  early  in  the  year.) 
Urethane. — Lagowoi  finds  it  very  useful  in  insomnia  arising 
from  nervous  excitability,  but  it  is  less  pronounced  in  its  effects  where 
there  is  local  pain.  It  is  indicated  in  delirium  tremens,  and  some 
forms  of  mania  and  melancholia  ;  also  to  combat  the  cerebral  phen- 
omena of  typhoid.  The  dose  varies  between  1*0  and  4*0.  Ure- 
thane augments  the  number  of  respirations,  but  has  no  action  on  the 
pulse  and  temperature.  The  sleep  produced  is  tranquil  and  is  followed 
by  no  disagreeable  sensations. 
Mercury  Injections. — Sirsky  reports  300  cases  treated  with 
7000  hypodermic  injections  of  mercury.  Stomatitis  very  rarely  ap- 
jjeared  and  no  abscesses  were  formed.  In  5  cases  there  was  superficial 
cutaneous  gangrene,  caused  by  penetration  into  the  true  skin.  Sirsky 
injected  but  15  centigm  of  mercury  to  the  dose,  and  used  soluble  salts 
exclusively.  To  make  the  injections  wholly  painless  he  sometimes 
added  to  the  mercury  solution  a  solution  of  1  to  100  of  cocaine 
nitrate. 
Antagonism  of  Strychnine  and  Alcohol. — The  results  of 
Jarochewsky's  recent  experiments  on  dogs,  are  summed  up  as  follows  : 
Strychnine  prevents  alcoholic  inebriation  ;  at  the  same  time  it  enables 
the  organism  to  support  large  doses  of  alcohol  for  a  very  long  time  j 
it  preserves  the  organs  (liver  and  vessels)  from  the  characteristic  al- 
terations produced  by  alcoholism.    The  action  of  strychnine  is,  up  to 
