A.m.  Jour.  PL  rm. 
May,  1894. 
Terebene. 
225 
calcareous  structure,  as  well  as  the  cartilaginous  portion  of  its  anat- 
omy, from  the  substance  enclosed  within  the  shell,  then  calcium  must 
certainly  be  there,  pre-existent.  Then,  on  the  other  hand,  if  vege- 
table juices  or  ferments  are  found  to  act  best  in  alkaline  media,  it 
would  indicate  that,  whilst  there  may  be  an  analogy  of  function 
between  the  animal  and  vegetable  ferments,  yet  they  cannot  indis- 
criminately be  applied  or  used  to  restore  diminished  function  in  the 
animal  economy.  If  the  vegetable  ferments,  acting  on  the  vegetable 
economy,  change  the  albumen  of  plants  to  the  more  assimilable  al- 
bumose  in  alkaline  media  only,  this  too  would  seem  highly  rational, 
because  the  normal  juices  of  plants  must  be  acid,  else  how  could  the 
soil-nutrition — the  phosphatic  elements — be  taken  up  and  appro- 
priated ? 
In  conclusion,  it  may  be  said,  then,  that  these  two  ferments  can 
only  be  compared  in  their  analogy,  their  functions  being  adapted  to 
different  organisms.  But  these  few  cursory  thoughts  may  furnish 
hints  to  the  investigator  and  prove  the  initial  of  some  interesting 
researches. 
TEREBENE.  - 
By  H.  W.  Jayne,  Ph.D. 
The  Pharmacopoeia  of  1890  requires  that  a  pure  terebene  should 
have  a  specific  gravity  of  0-862  at  150  C,  and  boil  between  I56°and 
1600  C.  In  a  paper  read  before  this  society  in  1887  (American 
Journal  Pharmacy,  1887,  p.  65),  I  showed  that  a  pure  preparation 
contains  no  fraction  below  1600  C,  and  the  same  conclusion  was 
reached  by  Power  and  Kleber  (Phar.  Rundschau,  January,  1894). 
Since  1887,  I  have  examined  a  very  large  number  of  samples,  and 
have  found  that  all  really  pure  and  inactive  terebenes  gave  no  frac- 
tions under  1650,  and  very  few,  if  any,  under  1700.  In  these  samples 
I  have  also  found  a  wide  variation  in  specific  gravity.  When  we 
consider  the  difference  in  the  gravity  of  commercial  oil  of  turpen- 
tine, and  note  that  the  Pharmacopoeia  does  not  require  the  turpen- 
tine used  in  manufacturing  terebene  to  have  a  certain  gravity,  it  is 
to  be  expected  that  the  resulting  preparations  should  show  widely 
different  gravities. 
Experience  has  shown  that  terebene  is  approximately  0  02  lighter 
than  the  turpentine  from  which  it  has  been  made. 
