CATECHU.
277
contained in pear-shaped cellular organic sacs, placed near the genital organs of both thedale and female animals. It is a substance analogous to civet and musk, of a consist-ence similar to thick honey. It has a bitter acrid taste; a powerful, penetrating, fetid,nnd very volatile smell; but, when dried, it becomes inodorous. Several chemists, andJ? Particular Bouillon Lagrange, Laugier , and Hildebrandt, have examined castor, andfound it to be composed of a resin, a fatty substance, a volatile oil, an extractive matter,benzoic acid, and some salts.
The mode of preparing it is very simple. The sacs are cut ofF from the castors whenthey are killed, and are dried to prevent the skin being affected by the weather. In thisstate, the interior substance is solid, of a dark color, and a faint smell; it softens withheat, and becomes brittle by cold. Its fracture betrays fragments of membranes, indi-cating its organic structure. When chewed, it adheres to the teeth somewhat like wax;1 has a bitter, slightly aciid, and nauseous taste.
Ihe castor bags, as imported, are often joined in pairs by a kind of ligature. Some-imes the substance which constitutes their value is sophisticated; a portion of the cas-< reum being extracted, and replaced by lead, clay, gums, or some other foreign matters.Jus fraud may be easily detected, even when it exists in a small degree, by the absence
Jue membranous partitions in the interior of the bags, as well as by the altered smellanc * taste.
The use of castoreum in medicine is considerable, especially in nervous and spasmodicleases, and it is often advantageously combined with opium.
LASTORINE. A chemical principle lately discovered to the amount of a few parts
*1 cent, in Castoreum.
^ASTOE OIL. The expressed oil of the seeds of'the Palma Christi , or Picimis«?*«*,* nalive'tree of the West Indies and South America ; but which has been eul-_ ted in France, Italy, and Spain . Bnssy and Lecanu discovered in it 3 species ofo ^. mat _ters, obtained partly by saponification, and partly by dry distillation—the mar-51 * 1 * * * . » Acinic, and elaiodic acids. None of these has been separately applied to anythe arts.
Ib s . quantity of castor oil imported in 1835 into the United Kingdom was 1,109,307*" or k° me consumption, 670,205 lbs. See Oils.tl le . ^UCHU, absurdly called Terra Japonica, is an extract made from the wood ofi s _ ee mimosa catechu, which grows in Bombay, Bengal, and other parts of India . Its 0 j ul - e F ure d by boiling the chips of the interior of the trunk in water, evaporating thehard 101 * t0 con sistence of sirup over the fire, and then exposing it in the sun tois 0 j* n * . ft occurs in flat rough cakes, and under two forms. The first, or the Bombay,is mo UrU r fonn tenure, of a dark red color, and of specific gravity 1*39. The secondsftealf 6 * hte and less solid. It has a chocolate color, and is marked inside with red
Acco-iT tS specific Sravfty is 1*28.
to Sir H. Davy , these two species are composed as follows :—
tannin .
M-
^tractive
«cila Ke
Matters, sand and lime
Bombay.
Bengal. I
54-5
48-5
34-0
36-5
6-5
8
5
7
100-0
100-0
. nut*
P'eces tvate i ? re a ' so f° un d to yield catechu; for which purpose they are cut into51 s Pecies ofnf' an eart * len P°t tvith solution of nitre, and have a little of the hark ofan 'hsnissn. i 'P 05 * 1 added to them. The liquor is then boiled with the nuts, and affordsGood^cateoh . OCti on-.
v «y astrin<* ent 'I * S a compact solid, of a dull fracture. It has no smell, but a
^ P r obably° a( j ( | j S l e ‘. Water dissolves the whole of it, except the earthy matter, which1 16 latter mav h < ™ nn £. * ts preparation. Alcohol dissolves its tannin and extractive,'atechu i n water* ox ^j ze( i>_and thus rendered insoluble in alcohol, by dissolving ther gMss. ’ ex P°sing it for some time to a boiling heat, and evaporating to
soluble i n water Ca l ac ^ a differs from that of galls, in being soluble in alcohol, and morejdu a % becomes V>rown'* 1 ^^ ta<:es * ron of an olive color, and gelatin in a mass which
I haveTn 0 ' 6 ^ ladia for tanning skins, where it is said to effect this object
•hu T 8 ’ ihe ox-hide J 1 p ’ ece °*" s °le leather completely tanned by it in this country in
the solution of rat eel ^ ^ ee T n ma de into a hag, with the hair outside, and kept filled