16+  Note  on  Crystallised  Gall  Stones.    {  AmMJa°rch,  ^i™" 
EXAMINATION  OF  A  SAMPLE  OF  GUM  ASAFCET1DA. 
By  Edo  Claassen, 
east  cleveland,  ohio. 
A  piece  of  gum  asafcetida,  in  which  whitish,  shining  specks  could 
be  seen,  was  subjected  to  an  examination  to  determine  its  purity.  It 
weighed  9.310  Gm.  By  extracting  it  with  hot  water,  followed  by 
some  alcohol,  it  left  a  residue,  composed  of  particles  of  rock,  partly 
whitish  and  shining,  partly  grayish  with  black  spots.  The  first 
proved  to  be  calcite  and  the  others  granite,  the  black  spots  in  this 
being  amphibole ;  their  weight  was  4.241  Gm.  The  granite  par- 
ticles, one  of  which  weighed  0.820  Gm.,  could  be  easily  separated  by 
a  pair  of  pincers ;  they  weighed  0.935  Gm.,  so  that  the  calcite 
amounted  to  3.306  Gm.  It  will  be  seen  that  the  adulterations  repre- 
sented nearly  half  the  quantity  of  the  gum,  the  percentage  being  gum 
54.45  per  cent.,  calcite  35.51  per  cent,  and  granite  10.04  Per  cent.. 
The  adulteration  of  another  piece  of  gum,  previously  examined, 
consisted  of  calcite  only  in  about  the  same  amount. 
A  NOTE  ON  CRYSTALLIZED  GALL  STONES. 
By  Edo  Claassen, 
east  cleveland,  ohio. 
Quite  a  number  of  interesting  bodies  were  passed  by  a  woman, 
45  years  old.  Most  of  them  were  small,  grainlike ;  several,  however, 
were  of  a  larger  size,  up  to  that  of  a  pea.  Their  color  was  yellow- 
ish, somewhat  shining.  Heated  on  platinum  foil,  they  melted  at 
first,  then  evaporated,  leaving  a  little  of  a  dark  substance  and  when 
ignited,  burned  with  a  yellow  flame.  They  dissolved  in  hot  alcohol, 
the  solution  leaving,  when  evaporated  on  a  slide,  four-sided  rhombic 
plates ;  the  largest  crystals,  being  polyhedral  with  a  diameter  from 
6.10  10  millimeters  and  weighing  up  to  0.384  Gm.  One  of  these, 
particularly,  weighing  0.208  Gm.,  surpassed  the  others  by  its  quite 
regular  shape;  it  belonged  to  the  regular  (the  tesseral)  crystal 
system,  being  a  cjombination  of  .  the  predominant  cube  with  the  octa- 
hedron and  the  dodecahedron  =  00  O  oo-0-oo  O.,  which  was  proven 
by  measuring  its  angles  by  means  of  a  hand  goniometer.  All  the 
above  properties  are  known  to  be  such,  as  belong  to  cholesterin, 
which  in  fact  they  represent. 
