146 
SELECTED ARTICLES. 
pared, of the kuchila (native name of nux vomica bark) from 
the bazars, and from a Strychnos nux vomica tree in the 
Botanical Garden, kindly supplied by Dr. Wallich, were 
readily procured and compared with each other — all were 
found identical in their physical and chemical composition, all 
yielded Brucine and traces of strychnine, and all produced 
the same toxicological effects. 
On a reference to the characters assigned by the authorities 
I have quoted as distinctive of the false angustura, we find the 
following chemical tests: — 1st, nitric acid, which changes the 
interior of the bark to a blood-red color, and causes the red 
external exuberance to become green; 2dly, the prussiate of 
potash, which causes in an infusion of the bark a faint green 
color; and 3dly, sulphate of iron, which changes the infusion 
to a deep green. To all these re-agents the nux vomica bark 
presents the described indications. 
The most remarkable and curious of the external characters 
of the nux vomica bark, and one in itself an indisputable 
proof of its being the false angustura, is the singular red exube- 
rance which occurs on the outer surface of the specimens now 
presented to the Society. 
This red exuberance was the first property of the spurious 
angustura bark which attracted attention in Europe, M. Fee 
states that it frequently happens that " the false angustura has 
a spongy exuberance of a very beautiful rust color, and that 
M. Pelletier, who had analysed it, had, by mistake, described 
it as a lichen of the genus Chiodecton. 
M. Fee denies that it is a lichen, and considers it as the 
result of a leprous disease of the bark, the stages in which he 
clearly and correctly describes. It commences, he states, by 
little regular prominences, surrounded by decayed epidermis. 
These tubercles increase in size, become irregular in outline, 
and confluent, and pass through the several shades between a 
clear yellow and iron-rust color. 
When the disease is of long standing, the part affected ac- 
quires considerable thickness, and is much deformed. No 
