As thus obtained, Veratria is a grayish or brownish-white powder, uncrystallizable, inodorous, bitter and extremely acrid to the taste, producing through the mouth and fauces a durable sensation of tingling and numbness, fusible by heat, scarcely soluble in cold water, soluble in 1000 parts of boiling water, which it renders perceptibly acrid, freely soluble in alcohol, somewhat less so in ether, and capable of neutralizing the acids, with some of which it forms soluble salts. Though inodorous, it produces violent sneezing and coryza. it is characterized by becoming reddened with sulphuric acid, forming a yellow solution with nitric acid, and yielding a white precipitate with tannic acid or ammonia, added to its solution in dilute acetic acid. The following is a new, and is said to be a very delicate test of Veratria, by which it may be distinguished from all other known substances. if a mere trace of the alkaloid be dissolved in muriatic acid, so as to produce a colourless solution, and this be boiled for some time, it will assume a red colour, which will in the end become intense, resembling that of permanganate of potassa, and remaining a long time unchanged on standing. (Amer. Journ. of Pharm., Nov. 1863, p. 556.) it is wholly dissipated at a red heat. According to M. Couerbe, the Veratria here described is not pure, containing two other principles, which he calls respectively sabadillia and veratrin, the former possessing alkaline properties. But for medicinal purposes there is no occasion for obtaining it perfectly pure. it consists of nitrogen, carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen.