130        Recent  Literature  Relating  to  Pharmacy.  {Al^rc£ 
RECENT  LITERATURE  RELATING  TO  PHARMACY. 
PERSIAN  TOBACCO. 
The  Persians  smoke  a  species  of  Nicotiana — probably  N.  Persica 
— which  they  call  tumbac.  M.  R.  Georgiades  {Bull.  Soc.  Phar.  de 
Bordeaux,  1899,  179)  discusses  this  plant  and  its  uses,  referring  to 
the  native  method  of  curing  and  the  smoking  of  same  through  the 
narghileh — the  oriental  water  pipe.  The  writer,  desiring  to  know  if 
the  use  of  this  species  of  wash  bottle  lessened  the  probability  of 
absorption  of  nicotine  by  the  smoker,  estimated  the  alkaloid  in  the 
dry  tobacco,  in  the  wash  liquor  of  the  pipe,  which  is  called  the  nafasy 
and  lastly  in  the  inhaled  smoke,  running  the  latter  into  a  wash 
bottle  containing  water. 
Assayed  by  the  method  of  Schloesing,  each  18  grammes  of  to- 
bacco (a  pipeful)  showed  0-947  gramme  nicotine,  the  nafas  through 
which  this  quantity  of  tobacco  was  smoked  showed  0-595  gramme 
nicotine,  while  the  washed  smoke  from  same  amount  contained  but 
0-0225  gramme. 
The  figures  are  of  course  approximate,  but  they  show  the  value 
of  such  forms  of  nicotine  absorbers. 
The  article  contains  analyses  of  moisture  and  salts  in  the  tumbac — 
results  similar  to  those  from  American  tobacco. 
H.  V.  Arny. 
A  NEW  REAGENT  FOR  MORPHINE. 
Professor  R.  Kobert  reports  {Ztschrft.  Oest.  Ap.  Vereins,  1899,  368) 
on  the  value  of  formalin — sulphuric  acid  (made  by  adding  2  or  3 
drops  formalin  solution — 40  per  cent.  ? — to  3  c.c.  concentrated  sul- 
phuric acid) — as  a  watch-crystal  color  reagent  for  morphine  and  its 
derivatives.  It  colors  morphine  purple-red,  then  violet,  then  blue- 
violet,  and  finally  pure  blue.  The  solution  gives  an  absorption 
spectrum  from  which  the  orange  and  yellow  is  extinguished. 
The  report  gives  the  color  modifications  when  dionine,  codeine, 
heroine  and  peronine  are  employed.  It  is  interesting  that  the  re- 
agent colors  methylphen-morpholin  a  deep  red.  This  substance 
has  no  medical  properties  in  common  with  morphine,  but  is  a  de- 
composition product  of  same  and  an  agent  in  synthesis  of  the  alka- 
loid. 
H.  V.  A. 
