CINCHONINE. Syn. Cinchonia. C20H24N2O. This alkaloid abounds most in the paler varieties of the cinchona barks. It occurs in clear, colourless, four-sided prisms, which are soluble in 30 parts of water, and in about 400 parts of ether and 120 of spirits of wine. With acids it forms soluble salts, which do not fluoresce in solution, and are turned lightish brown-yellow by the chlorine and ammonia tests. Of its salts, the hydriodate is readily soluble in water, and still more so in alcohol, whether dilute or strong. Cinchonine may be prepared from its sulphate or disulphate in the same way as quinine.
Cinchonine, Sulphate of. Syn. Cinchoniæ sulphas. (Ph. U. S.) Take of the mother-water remaining after the crystallisation of sulphate of quinia in the process for preparing that salt a convenient quantity, solution of soda, alcohol, diluted sulphuric acid, animal charcoal in fine powder, each a sufficient quantity. To the mother-water add gradually with constant stirring solution of soda, until the liquid becomes alkaline. Collect on a filter the precipitate formed, wash it with water, and dry it. Then wash it with successive small portions of alcohol to remove other alkaloids which may be present, mix the residue with 8 times its weight of water, and having heated the mixture, add gradually diluted sulphuric acid until it is neutralised and becomes clear. Then boil the liquid with animal charcoal, filter it while hot, and set it aside to crystallise. Lastly, drain the crystals and dry them on bibulous paper. By evaporating the mother-liquid more crystals may be obtained.
CINCHO-TANNIC ACID. This acid is precipitated from a decoction of bark by acetate of lead, after the decoction has been freed from cinchona red by means of magnesia.
If the cincho-tannate of lead thus formed be decomposed by sulphuretted hydrogen, and the solution carefully evaporated in vacuo, the acid may be obtained as an amorphous, hygroscopic substance, readily soluble in water. A ferric salt added to a solution of this acid imparts a greenish colour to it.
Cincho-tannic acid is very soluble in water, but not in acids. Therefore a concentrated watery infusion (1 to 4) of Indian bark gives a precipitate upon the addition of strong hydrochloric acid. By this means a rough estimation may be formed of the amount of cincho-tannic acid in a sample of bark.
CINCHOVATINE. The substance known under this name does not exist as an alkaloid, sui generis. It is nothing more than quinidine, or cinchonidine, or a mixture of both.
CINNABAR. Syn. Native Vermillion. This compound, which is one of the most abundant of the ores of mercury, is a product of considerable importance in the arts, and some portions of it are sometimes sufficiently pure in colour to be used after mere levigation. Generally, however, the factitious kind is employed. See Vermilion.
CINNAMEIN. C16H14O2. Syn. Oil of balsam of Peru. A volatile oil existing in balsam of Peru.
CINNAMIC ACID. HC9H7O2. A colourless, transparent, crystalline substance, obtained from oil of cinnamon, liquid storax, balsam of Peru, and balsam of tolu. It is freely dissolved by alcohol, but nearly insoluble in water. At 248° Fahr. it fuses, and at 560° Fahr. it sublimes unchanged. Distilled with dichromate of potassium and sulphuric acid it is converted into benzoic acid. Its salts are called cinnamates.
CINNAMON. Syn. Cinnamon Bark; Cinnamomi cortex (B. P.), L. The inner bark of shoots from the truncated stock of the Cinnamomum Zeylanicum, imported from Ceylon, and distinguished in commerce as Ceylon cinnamon. The best is obtained from branches about three years old.