ON  THE  USE  OP  QUINOVIC  ACID  IN  MEDICINE.  427 
appears  from  this  report  that  the  quinovic  acid  has  been  used 
in  the  hospital  of  the  west-coast  of  Sumatra  in  sixty-five  cases 
of  intermittent  fever,  with  or  without  complications,  and  in  the 
great  majority  of  cases  with  perfect  success.  In  the  hospital 
at  Samarang,  it  has  been  used  with  the  same  success  in  forty- 
five  cases,  and  it  is  with  great  satisfaction  that  I  quote  the 
following  passage  from  the  report  respecting  the  experiments  at 
Samarang : — 
"  The  application  of  quinovic  acid  in  diarrhoea  and  dysentery 
was  made  in  consequence  of  the  observation  of  its  physiological 
action  in  diminishing  the  secretion  of  the  intestines,  which  was 
attributed  to  a  diminution  of  the  peristaltic  motion.  In  this 
aspect  also  the  results  were  very  satisfactory,  and  it  is  there- 
fore a  new  property  of  the  quinovic  acid  discovered,  which 
agrees  with  the  tonic  properties  which  have  been  ascribed  to  it 
by  Dr.  de  Vry." 
It  appears  therefore  not  only  that  my  suggestion  about  the 
tonic  properties  of  the  quinovic  acid  is  well  founded,  but  also 
that  it  is  a  remedy  against  intermittent  fever.  I  therefore 
venture  the  suggestion  to  use  the  leaves  of  cinchona  in  British 
India  against  jungle-fever,  which  is  in  many  districts  a  real 
plague.  If  the  leaves  are  collected  in  the  different  cinchona 
plantations,  which  can  be  done  without  great  cost,  a  tincture 
could  be  prepared  from  them  with  proof  spirit,  in  which  men- 
struum quinovic  acid  is  easily  dissolved,  but  not  chlorophyll 
and  some  other  inactive  substances.  I  have  much  expectation 
that  the  proper  use  of  such  a  tincture  as  a  prophylactic  would 
prevent  many  cases  of  jungle-fever  in  the  localities  where  they 
are  endemic.  As  the  manufacturers  of  quinine  throw  away 
every  year  some  hundred  pounds  of  a  substance  containing 
quinovic  acid,  there  is  abundance  of  material  for  further  experi- 
ments. I  have  found  besides  that  the  so-called  naucleie  acid, 
discovered  by  Mr.  C.  Bernelot  Moens,  military  pharmaceutist 
at  Batavia,  in  a  species  of  Nauclea,  is  identical  with  quinovic 
acid ;  and  as,  according  to  my  investigations,  all  the  species  of 
Nauelea.  which  are  plentiful  in  the  forest  of  Java,  contain  this 
acid  in  their  bark,  we  have  here  another  source  whence  an 
abundant  supply  could  be  obtained. — London  Pharm.  Journ., 
July  1,  1864. 
