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ON  A  FALSE  CINCHONA  BARK  OF  INDIA. 
which  expired  at  the  end  of  63  minutes,  exhausting  nearly  half  the 
contents  of  the  phial. 
These  experiments  were  several  times  repeated,  and  always 
with  the  same  results.  In  our  experiments  the  rhigolene  phial, 
while  aflame,  was  accidentally  upset,  and  the  contents  poured 
out  upon  the  table,  burning  with  a  beautiful  flame,  and  was 
rapidly  consumed,  leaving  the  table  (walnut)  nearly  unscorched. 
These  observations  show,  I  think,  that  the  rhigolene  is  cer- 
tainly not  explosive  in  the  sense  that  gunpowder  and  nitro-gly- 
cerineare,  and  that  while  more  volatile  and  inflammable  than 
ether,  that  the  dangers  to  be  apprehended  while  using  it,  are 
precisely  those  attending  the  use  of  the  latter. 
A  bottle  stoppered  tightly  with  glass,  exposed  in  a  room  at 
a  temperature  above  70  F.,  may  have  the  stopper  to  dance,  from 
the  volatilization  of  some  of  the  rhigolene,  and  so  in  the  use  of 
the  Richardson's  instrument,  the  cork  is  sometimes  blown  out 
for  the  same  reason.  The  hand  directly  in  contact  writh  a  bottle 
containing  ether  or  rhigolene,  produced  a  temperature  sufficient 
to  volatilize  either— the  ether  (+  96°  F.,)  or  rhigolene  (+  TO0 
F.)  For  preventing  this,  we  know  of  no  better  method  than 
that  adopted  by  Dr.  Krackowizer-— the  enclosing  of  the  bottle 
within  a  double-walled  wire  gauze  box,  the  space  between  the 
inner  wall  and  bottle  being  filled  with  wet  sponge,  the  evapora- 
tion from  which  always  keeps  the  contents  of  the  bottle  below 
boiling  point. 
Dr.  Bigelow  has  depressed  the  mercury  with  rhigolene  to 
— 19°  and  Page  to  — 16°,  while  Dr.  Krackowizer  could  never 
get  a  lower  temperature  than  — 8°.  Our  experience  more  read- 
ly  corresponds  with  the  last  experimenters,  being  able,  with  Tie- 
mann's  modification  of  Richardson's  apparatus,  to  depress  the 
mercury  to  -—10°. —  Western  Journ.  of  Medicine,  April,  1868. 
ON  A  FALSE  CINCHONA  BARK  OF  INDIA. 
By  J.  Broughton,  B.SC.,  F.C.S., 
Chemist  to  the  Government  Cinchona  Plantations  of  the  Madras  Presidency. 
Among  the  numerous  indigenous  febrifuges  of  South  India, 
one  of  the  most  interesting  is  the  bark  of  the  Hymenodictyon 
