2l6 
Remarks  on  Digitalis. 
Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
May,  1915. 
have  discovered — new  principles  of  various  nature.  The  number 
of  so-called  active  constituents  of  the  plant  is  growing-  daily.  Merck 
&  Co.,  in  their  annual  report  of  191 1,  mention  92  different  articles, 
with  their  discoverers  and  properties,  and  the  number  has  been  in- 
creased considerably  since  then.  Many  of  these  are  identical,  and 
a  good  many  are  mentioned  only  in  the  papers  published  by  their 
authors,  but  were  never  isolated  or  brought  in  the  market.  Among 
these  many  names  four  stand  out  prominently,  namely,  digitalin, 
digitonin,  digitoxin,  and  digitalein.  ' 
The  oldest  one  of  these,  digitalin-Xativelle,  was  isolated  by  the 
French  chemist  Nativelle,  who  claimed  it  to  be  a  pure  substance, 
while  Schmiedeberg,  who  made  an  extensive  examination  of  the 
plant,  pronounces  Nativelle's  digitalin  a  mixture  of  several  sub- 
stances, and  gave  the  name  digitalin  to  another  chemically  uniform, 
amorphous  body  for  which  he  presented  a  formula.  Another  digi- 
talin was  isolated  by  Kiliani,  another  by  Homolle-Ouevenne,  another 
by  Lancelot,  another  by  Lebourdais,  and  so  on.  In  Merck's  list  the 
name  of  digitalin  appears  37  times,  each  time  denoting  a  different 
article.  No  wonder  that  a  confusion  prevails  and  that  prescribers 
and  dispensers  are  at  a  loss  what  is  meant  by  digitalin.  It  is  not  the 
object  of  this  paper  to  enter  into  the  merits  of  these  numerous 
glucosides  for  each  of  which  the  discoverer  or  manufacturer  claims  a 
certain  superiority  over  others.  But  in  view  of  these  different  re- 
sults obtained  by  men  of  great  learning,  long  experience,  and  re- 
nowned ability,  we  are  led  to  the  question  if  there  is  not  a  reason 
for  this  disagreement  and  if  perhaps  some  fundamental  facts  or 
principles  have  been  overlooked. 
Now,  in  trying  to  bring  the  various  results  into  some  classifica- 
tion, we  notice  that  nearly  all  agree  on  the  fact  that  some  of  the 
products  are  soluble  in  water,  some  insoluble  in  water  but  soluble  in 
alcohol.  Kiliani  states  that  digitoxin  is  insoluble  in  water,  Hatcher 
makes  the  same  statement,  while  Cloetta  separated  a  soluble  digitoxin, 
to  which  the  name  of  digalen  was  given.  It  is  further  stated  that, 
while  digitoxin  is  insoluble  in  water,  it  becomes  soluble  in  water,  best 
in  hot  water,  in  the  presence  of  a  certain  saponin  that  is  also  present 
and  which,  according  to  some  authorities,  is  identical  with  digitalein, 
according  to  others  with  digitonin.  The  presence  of  a  saponin  is 
also  claimed  by  a  number  of  other  investigators,  but  by  no  means  by 
all.  It  is  on  this  basis  that  Hatcher  makes  the  claim  that  the  infusion 
contains  all  the  active  ingredients  of  digitalis  held  in  solution  by 
