ng back
multiplied by 0.42 gives the percentage of cocaine in the sample. The
following are some of the results with different samples of coca
leaves of various age:

Contained per cent.
of Cocaine.
Coca leaves from Mapiri, 1 month old 0.5% \
" " " Yungas " " 0.5% |
" " " Mapiri and Yungas |
6 months old 0.4% | Of the
" " " Cuzco (Peru) |_ weight of
6 months old 0.3% | the dry
" " " Mapiri and Yungas | leaves.
1 year old 0.3% |
" " " Cuzco " " " 0.2% |
" " " Mapiri and Yungas |
2 years old 0.15%/

Coca leaves from Yungas and Cuzco, three years old, contained no trace
of the alkaloid, whereas fresh green leaves from Yungas contained 0.7
per cent. of the weight of the dry leaves. The same process is also
applicable for the manufacture of quinine from poor quinine bark, with
the single alteration that weak sulphuric acid must be used for the
neutralization of the alkaline petroleum extract.--_H.T. Pfeiffer,
Chem. Zeit. 11._

* * * * *

[Continued from SUPPLEMENT, No. 622, page 9941.]

THE CHEMICAL BASIS OF PLANT FORMS.[1]

By HELEN C. DE S. ABBOTT.

The succession of plants from the lower to the higher forms will be
reviewed superficially, and chemical compounds noted where they
appear.

When the germinating spores of the fungi, _myxomycetes_, rupture their
walls and become masses of naked protoplasm, they are known as
plasmodia. The plasmodium _AEthalium septicum_ occurs in moist places,
on heaps of tan or decaying barks. It is a soft, gelatinous mass of
yellowish color, sometimes measuring several inches in length.

The plasmodium[2] has been chemically analyzed, though not in a state
of absolute purity. The table of Reinke and Rodewold gives an idea of
its proximate constitution.

Many of the constituents given are always present in the living cells
of higher plants. It cannot be too emphatically stated that where
"biotic" force is manifested, these colloidal or albuminous compounds
are found.

T