Am.  Jour.  PharrD.") 
April,  18S9.  / 
A  Note  on  Cardamoms. 
173 
In  1873,  eighteen  years  after  the  publication  of  Hanbury's  paper, 
among  the  thousands  of  objects  exhibited  at  the  Vienna  Exposition, 
there  were  exhibited  samples  of  cardamoms  from  Siam  and  China, 
agreeing  perfectly  with  the  descriptions  of  the  rare  kinds  in  Han- 
bury's paper.  These  samples  are  in  the  Philadelphia  Museums,  and 
when  supplemented  by  a  series  of  specimens  collected  some  fifteen 
years  ago  in  the  bazaars  of  India,  and  others  showing  the  commer- 
cial varieties  of  to-day,  they  make  the  most  interesting  collection  of 
cardamoms  ever  gotten  together. 
Many  of  the  specimens  comprising  this  collection  were  received, 
labelled  simply  "  Cardamoms,"  and  their  identification  at  the  Phila- 
delphia Museums  with  Hanbury's  excellent  descriptions,  published 
nearly  fifty  years  ago,  have  proved  a  most  interesting  study. 
A  case  of  cardamoms  exhibited  by  the  Siamese  Government  at 
the  World's  Fair  in  1893,  was  labelled  "Wild  or  Bastard  Carda- 
moms." It  was  found  upon  examination  to  contain  a  mixture  of 
fully  ten  distinct  varieties,  some  belonging  in  the  genus  Amonium, 
and  others  to  the  nearly  related  genus,  Alpinia. 
Pharmacists  and  all  engaged  in  the  handling  of  cardamoms  will 
do  well  to  examine  the  collection  in  the  Philadelphia  Museums,  as  a 
number  of  these  varieties  have  little  or  no  aromatic  properties  and 
the  same  might  be  foisted  upon  them  instead  of  the  official  drug. 
Localization  of  Alkaloids. — Nicotin  is  contained,  according  to  Wijsman- 
Leyden  {Sudd.  Apoth.  Zeit.>  1898,  636),  as  a  rule,  in  the  cells  underneath  the 
hairs.  It  is  also  found  in  the  cells  of  the  upper  epidermis.  The  question  is, 
therefore,  an  open  one  as  to  whether  it  is  contained  in  the  protoplasm  or  in  the 
vacuoles.  If  one  removes  a  piece  of  the  upper  epidermis  of  a  tobacco  leaf  and 
places  it  in  an  iodine  solution  the  nicotin  reaction  occurs  immediately,  in  the 
form  of  a  brown  coarse-grained  precipitate,  at  the  basal  end  of  the  under  cell. 
The  precipitate  then  extends  along  the  side  walls.  The  reason  for  this  slow 
action  along  the  side  walls  of  the  cells  of  the  hair  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  latter 
like  the  outer  walls  of  the  upper  epidermal  cells  are  cutinizedso  that  the  iodine 
solution  enters  slowly.  It  appears  as  if  the  nicotin  is  dissolved  in  the  cell  sap 
(vacuoles). 
If  cells  containing  berberin  are  plasmolyzed  with  concentrated  nitric  acid, 
the  contents  at  the  point  where  they  are  concentrated  are  colored  darker.  After 
awhile  the  vacuole  wall  disappears  and  the  nitric  acid  penetrates  into  the  vacu- 
ole. Then  there  appears  a  granular  precipitate  of  berberin  nitrate,  which  soon 
begins  to  crystallize.  The  vacuole  is  filled  with  groups  of  crystals  of  berber- 
ine  nitrate,  which,  by  and  by,  occupy  the  whole  space,  and  after  the  vacuole 
collapses  remain  as  sphere  crystals. 
