262  New  Source  of  Santonin.         \  A\pXi92iarm' 
ments,  the  whole  plant  being  hoary  and  tomentose.  The  flower 
beads,  often  reddish  and  crowned,  are  3-  to  8-flowered,  ovoid  or 
oblong,  suberect,  in  spicate  fascicles ;  involucral  bracts  linear-oblong, 
the  outer  herbaceous,  tomentose,  the  inner  scarious,  acute  and 
glabrous.  It  occurs,  from  Kashmir  to  Kumaon  at  an  altitude  of 
7000  to  9000  feet,  and  in  Western  Thibet  is  abundant  at  an  alti- 
tude of  9000  to  14,000  feet.  The  plant  appears,  therefore,  to  be 
distributed  over  a  very  wide  area,  and  to  occur  in  some  abundance. 
A  preliminary  experiment  having  shown  the  presence  of  a 
crystalline  substance  resembling  santonin,  100  Gms.  of  the  material 
were  divided  into  two  portions,  and  each  portion  extracted  in  a 
Soxhlet  with  chloroform  for  two  hours.2  The  chloro formic  solu- 
tions were  mixed  and  the  chloroform  distilled  off  on  a  water-bath 
until  about  10  Gms.  were  left.  To  this  about  250  Gms.  of  a  satu- 
rated aqueous  solution  of  barium  hydroxide  were  added  and  the 
flask  again  heated  on  the  water-bath  until  all  the  chloroform  was 
driven  off.  The  liquid  was  then  filtered  and  the  filter  washed  with 
a  little  boiling  water.  The  filtrate  was  acidified  with  15  Gms.  of 
hydrochloric  acid  (containing  25  per  cent,  of  HC1),  heated  on  a 
water-bath  for  a  few  minutes,  and,  when  lukewarm,  transferred  to 
a  large  separator.  The  flask  was  rinsed  with  40  c.  c.  of  chloro- 
form, which  was  transferred  to  the  separator  and  the  whole  shaken 
for  two  minutes.  After  separation  the  chloroform  was  drawn  off 
and  the  operation  repeated  with  two  more  successive  quantities  of 
40  c.  c.  chloroform.  The  united  chloroformic  solutions  were  dis- 
tilled to  dryness,  the  residue  dissolved  by  the  aid  of  heat  in  15  c.  c, 
of  absolute  alcohol,  and  85  Gms.  of  hot  distilled  water  added.  The 
milky  solution  was  immediately  filtered  into  a  tared  Erlenmeyer 
flask  and  the  residue  on  the  filter  washed  with  a  little  diluted  alcohol. 
Crystals,  however,  had  separated  during  filtration,  and  the  residue 
on  the  filter  paper  was  therefore  dried,  redissolved  in  absolute 
alcohol,  hot  distilled  water  added,  and  filtered  as  before.  After 
24  hours  the  crystals  that  had  separated  were  collected  on  a  tared 
filter  paper,  the  flasks  were  rinsed  with  20  c.  c.  of  a  mixture  of 
3  Gms.  of  absolute  alcohol  and  17  Gms.  of  distilled  water,  which 
2  See  "Year-Book  of  Pharmacy,  1914,"  p.  138. 
