Am.  Jour.  Pharm. ) 
January,  1915.  J 
Belladonna  and  Hyoscyamus. 
7 
No.  of  sample.  Weight  of  sample.  No.  of  pollen  grains. 
A  5  mg   931 
B  5  mg   766 
C  5  mg  •   890 
D  5  mg   986 
E  5  mg  1045 
A  commercial  sample  consisting  entirely  of  the  basal  leaves  of  the 
biennial  Henbane,  when  powdered  and  examined,  showed  only 
occasional  pollen  grains  in  five-milligramme  portions.  A  commer- 
cial sample  which  by  garbling  was  found  to  consist  of  eighty-nine 
Fig.  9. — Branching  hairs  found  on  the  young  growth  and  on  the  new  shoots  of  Atropa  Belladonna. 
per  cent,  basal  leaves  and  eleven  per  cent,  of  flowering  tops,  when 
powdered  and  examined  in  five-milligramme  portions,  was  found 
to  contain  from  seventy-five  to  one  hundred  pollen  grains  in  each 
portion.  From  these  observations  it  is  evident  that  the  number  of 
Hyoscyamus  pollen  grains  in  a  sample  of  powdered  Hyoscyamus  indi- 
cates the  amount  of  flowering  tops  in  the  drug  which  was  powdered. 
Alkaloids  and  Ash  in  Hyoscyamus. 
Numerous  results  on  the  amount  of  alkaloids  in  Hyoscyamus 
have  been  published,  but  for  the  most  part  these  results  have  been 
based  upon  the  examination  of  commercial  drug  material,  and,  while 
the  assays  have  probably  served  to  indicate,  in  a  general  way,  the 
medicinal  value  of  such  samples,  they  cannot  be  accepted  as  scientific 
