Am.  Jour.  Pharrn.  \ 
January.  1900.  J 
Constitution  of  the  Alkaloids. 
1 1 
any  plant  was  morphine,  and  the  honor  of  the  discovery  belongs  to 
the  German  apothecary,  Friedrich  Wilhelm  Serturner,  of  the  little 
town  of  Einbeck,  near  Hannover,  who,  in  1 805,  isolated  the  alkaloid 
morphine  and  recognized  its  basic  character.  Baume,  in  1802,  had 
isolated  a  substance  from  opium,  which  he  called  "  sel  essentiale 
opii,"  and  which  he  found  to  be  the  active  principle,  and  Derosne, 
in  1805,  and  Seguin,  in  1804,  had  also  separated  such  a  substance 
in  crystalline  form  and  of  decided  narcotic  nature,  but  neither  of 
them  recognized  the  alkaline  nature  of  the  same.  Serturner's 
views  as  to  the  alkalinity  of  morphine  met  with  no  favor  at  the 
time,  and  it  was  not  until  he  made  a  second  and  more  complete 
study  and  published  a  second  paper  on  the  subject  in  1 81 7,  that  the 
scientific  world  accepted  the  same  with  any  degree  of  credence. 
Then  all  of  a  sudden  it  dawned  on  this  scientific  world  that  a  new 
era  had  dawned  for  chemistry,  and 'that  an  epoch-making  discovery 
had  been  announced  by  the  modest  young  pharmacist  of  Einbeck. 
So  great  an  authority  as  Gay  Lussac  was  stirred  by  its  importance, 
and  he  says  in  the  Annates  de  Chimie  et  de  Physique ',  "  Nous  sommes 
surpris  que  le  premier  memoire  de  M.  Serturner  nait  pas  fixe  plus 
tot  l'attention  des  chimistes,  non  en  France,  ou  il  ne  parait  pas  qu'il 
ait  ete  connu,  mais  sur  le  reste  du  continent.  La  decouverte  d'une 
base  alcaline  formee  de  charbon,  d'hydrogen,  d'oxygene  et  d'azote, 
dans  laquelle  les  proprietes  neutralisantes  sout  tres  prononcees,  nous 
parait  de  la  plus  grande  importance.."  Serturner  did  the  first  part 
of  his  work  at  Paderborn,  in  Westphalia,  and  the  latter  part  of  it 
in  Einbeck.  He  recognized,  besides  the  basic  nature  of  morphine, 
its  powerful  narcotic  properties,  and  attributed  the  narcotic  proper- 
ties of  opium  to  it.  He  also  showed  that  ammonia  and  magnesia 
can  displace  it  from  its  salts  with  acids,  while  it,  when  in  this  free 
state,  can  displace  iron,  lead,  copper  and  mercury  from  their  salts. 
The  alkaloid  era  had  set  in,  and  from  this  year,  1817,  until  1835, 
chemists  labored  incessantly  on  the  new  class  of  alkaloids,  as  the 
following  list  of  discoveries  of  new  alkaloids  will  demonstrate: 
1817.  Morphine  By  Serturner. 
Emetine   "  Pelletier  and  Magendie. 
Narcotine   "  Robiquet. 
1818.  Veratrine   "  Meissner,  Pelletier  and  Caventou. 
Strychnine   "  Pelletier  and  Caventou, 
1819.  Brucine   .  .  .   "       "  " 
Piperine   "  Oersted. 
Delphinine   "  Brandes. 
