314 
MISCELLANY. 
which offer no well determined chemical characters. If we submit 
these products again to rectification, we obtain a yellow oil, which has 
been already examined by Elsner,as well as by Messrs. Pelletier and Wal- 
ter; their labours on this subject have led to nothing decisive. M.Dccpping 
has not been more fortunate. He confined himself to the task of show- 
ing that the rectified oil is plainly of the same composition as essence of 
turpentine, but that its boiling point is not constant, so that we cannot 
determine the density of its vapour. Treated with sulphuric acid the oil 
yields an oily carbonated hydrogen, which also shows a similar com- 
position. — Chemist, from Journ. de Pharm. 
Formula for Red Ink. — Two ounces of the best Brazil wood, half an 
ounce of alum, and half an ounce of crystals oftartarare boiled with six- 
teen ounces of rain or distilled water, down to half its bulk; half an ounce 
of gum arabic is dissolved in the strained liquid, and finally a tincture 
made of one and a half drams of cochineal and one and a half ounces 
of alcohol of 0.839 sp. grav. mixed with it. — Chem. Gazette. 
The danger of arsenical injections in bodies intended for dissection. — The 
competition that has recently taken place for the situation of Superin- 
tendent of the anatomical labours of the Faculty of Medicine at Mont- 
pellier, has shown the danger arising from the employment of arsenic 
in the preservation of bodies intended for dissection. 
Five of the candidates engaged in the dissection of bodies which had 
been injected with an arsenical solution, were not long before they be- 
came a prey to symptoms of a more or less dangerous character. Some 
were effected in the head with giddiness and dimness of sight, and the 
intellectual faculties became impaired and painful ; others suffered par- 
ticularly in the gastro-intestinal organs; violent pains, colic, diarrhoea, 
nausea, and vomitings affected them on the second day of their labour, 
and were followed by a feverish wakefulness. 
In the case of them all one symptom was exhibited which we may 
call pathognomonic, so much was the characteristic it exhibited uni- 
form and special ; all the candidates experienced a most violent shoot- 
ing and continued pain at the extremity of the fingers. The principal 
seat of this pain was in the fleshy part of the fingers, and even with- 
in the circumference of the nails it seemed impossible for any of the 
candidates to use an instrument of any description. An examination 
of the fingers exhibited a swelling at their extremity, and an injection, 
visible through the substance of the nail, resembling an ecchymosis, 
and in addition to this a violent pulsation in the collateral arteries ; the 
nail, after a time, completely separated itself from the surrounding tissues 
wherever the ecchymosis existed. — Chemist. 
