Am.  Jour.  Pharm.  \ 
January,  1906.  J 
A.  0.  A.  C.  Work  on  Drugs, 
47 
mixture  well  and  frequently  during  half  an  hour,  then  set  aside,  in 
a  cool  place,  for  twelve  hours. 
Collect  the  morphine  of  one  set  of  duplicates  on  counterpoised 
filter  papers  and  the  other  set  on  a  pledget  of  absorbent  cotton, 
lodged  in  the  throat  of  a  funnel  (both  being  dried  to  a  known,  con- 
stant weight)  in  the  following  manner :  Remove  the  stopper  carefully 
and  transfer  any  adhering  morphine  to  the  flask.  Pour  the  ethereal 
layer  on  the  cotton  or  filter  paper  as  the  case  may  be,  wash  the  con- 
tents of  the  flask  with  20  c.c.  more  of  ether,  transfer  to  respective 
funnels,  and,  when  this  ether  has  passed  through,  pour  the  contents 
of  the  flask  into  the  funnels.  Remove  the  remaining  adhering 
crystals  to  the  proper  funnels  by  means  of  small  portions  of  mor. 
phinated  water  and  wash  the  contents  of  the  funnels  with  morphinated 
alcohol  until  the  filtrate  passes  colorless.  When  the  crystals  have 
drained,  dry  to  constant  weight  at  about  6o°  C.  Determine  the 
weight  of  the  morphine  on  the  filter  paper  and  cotton,  respectively, 
and  report  results. 
Remove  morphine  from  filter  paper,  powder,  determine  purity  of 
same  by  Method  I,  parts  3  and  4,  using  about  one-half  of  the  mor- 
phine for  each  operation. 
Determine  purity  of  morphine  on  cotton  by  treating  with  deci- 
normal  sulphuric  acid  as  follows :  Remove  cotton  and  crystals  from 
funnel  by  means  of  a  small  glass  rod,  drawn  out  to  a  curved  point, 
to  a  beaker,  rinse  the  crystals  adhering  to  the  funnel  into  the  same 
beaker  with  24  c.c.  of  decinormal  sulphuric  acid  and  25  c.c.  of  dis- 
tilled water,  the  latter  following  the  former.  Agitate  the  contents 
of  the  beaker  until  the  crystals  are  dissolved  and  titrate  back  the 
excess  of  acid  with  N  /  40  potassium  hydroxid,  using  cochineal 
as  indicator.  Each  cubic  centimeter  of  decinormal  acid  represents 
30-09  milligrammes  of  crystallized  morphine.  The  morphine  ob- 
tained by  the  above  process  represents  4  grammes  of  opium.  From 
these  data  can  readily  be  calculated  the  per  cent,  of  morphine 
obtained,  to  which  add  1. 12  as  a  correction  for  the  morphine  remain- 
ing in  the  solvents  used. 
L.  F.  Keblek, 
Referee,  Medicinal  Plants  and  Drugs, 
United  States  Department  of  Agriculture, 
Bureau  oe  Chemistry,  H.  W.  Wiley,  Chief. 
Washington,  D.  C,  August  1,  1905. 
