CONVERSION  OF  CANE  SUGAR  INTO  GRAPE  SUGAR.  393 
keep  well,  owing  to  the  absence  of  albumen,  and  are,  with  the 
exception  of  their  fine  green  color,  equivalents  of  the  alcoholic 
narcotic  extracts  of  the  Pharmacopoeia. 
In  the  preparation  of  the  extracts  of  rhubarb  and  gentian  I 
have  found  a  decided  advantage  from  treating  the  roots  in  pieces 
of  the  size  of  shell-barks,  digesting  in  weak  alcohol  for  some 
days,  expressing,  filtering,  and  evaporating.  Too  much  care 
cannot  be  given  by  the  apothecary  to  the  quality  of  all  these 
preparations,  and  when  able  he  should  make  them  himself.  I  once 
heard  a  druggist  say  that  he  had  obtained  as  much  extract  of 
hyoscyamus  as  he  had  taken  of  herb,  and  he  seemed  to  think  it 
a  wonderful  feat.  He  boiled  the  leaves  in  water  for  half  a  day, 
transferred  them  to  a  coarse  bag  or  cork  sack,  and  expressed 
them  forcibly,  so  that  much  vegetable  pulp  was  separated  with 
the  decoction  and  remained  in  the  extract.* 
Baltimore,  July,  1855. 
CONVERSION  OF  CANE  SUGAR  INTO  GRAPE  SUGAR,  OBSERVED 
IN  THE  SYRUP  OF  IODIDE  OF  IRON  AND  SYRUP  OF  PROTO 
NITRATE  OF  IRON, 
Br  E.  S.  Wayne. 
My  attention  was  attracted,  recently,  by  a  singular  change 
which  had  taken  place  in  a  portion  of  syrup  of  iodide  of  iron  made 
by  myself,  (in  accordance  with  the  formula  of  the  U.  S.  P.)  I  had 
made  in  all  about  twenty  pounds  of  the  syrup,  which,  for  con- 
venience and  protection,  was  put  up  in  glass  stoppered  bottles, 
containing  each  one  pound ;  these  were  wrapped  in  paper  and 
placed  in  a  cool  location.  A  few  months  after  it  was  made,  I 
accidentally  removed  the  wrapper  from  one  of  the  remaining 
bottles,  and,  to  my  surprise,  found  that  nearly  the  whole  of 
its  contents  were  in  a  semi-solid  condition,  only  about  half  an 
inch  of  fluid  remaining,  and  resting  upon  the  solid  portion.  I 
then  examined  the  remaining  bottles  of  syrup,  and  to  my  astonish- 
ment, found  that  they  had  undergone  no  corresponding  change. 
From  the  appearance  of  the  solid  contents  of  the  bottle  thus 
[*  Note. — Eugene  Dupuy  (vol^  24,  page  219,  July  1852,)  gives  a  formula 
analogous  to  the  above  in  using  alcohol,  but  directs  the  leaves  to  be  dry  and 
treated  in  powder  with  the  alcohol. — Editor  Am.  Jour.  Pharm.] 
