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AMYLENE. 285
Externally it is used as a discutient application, and as a cold
lotion in fevers, hernia, etc.
Therapeutic Uses.— It is employed internally in amenorrhcea,
rheumatic affections, chronic bronchitis, pneumonia, dropsical
affections, hemorrhages, whooping-cough and myalgia. Exter-
nally in abscesses of the mamma, skin diseases, ecchymosis of
the eye, hydrocele, senile gangrene, gonorrhoea, leucorrhcea, etc.
Dose.—Of chloride of ammonium, gr. v-xxx, every two or
three hours, in powder or mucilage.
Dental Uses.—It is employed in facial neuralgia, in doses of
5ss, repeated four times daily. Externally it is used as an appli-
cation to indolent ulcers, for its stimulating effect. .As a gargle,
it is employed in the strength of 5ss to 5xij of water. It is also
applied to cancerous tumors, and has been used to restore zinc
which has become deteriorated from long use in laboratory work.
Chloride of ammonium (sal ammoniac) is also used as a flux, in
refining gold for laboratory use.

AMYLENE.
Formula.—C5H1Q.
Derivation.—Amylene is obtained by distilling amylic alcohol
with chloride of zinc. It is a colorless, very mobile liquid, with
a boiling point of 102°, and the density of its vapor 2.45. It
has a very peculiar and disagreeable smell.
Medical Properties and Physiological Action.—Amylene was in-
troduced as an anaesthetic in 1856, by the late Dr. Snow, who
regarded it as possessing the following advantages: the safety of
ether, absence of pungency and irritating property, readiness
with which the absense of pain is obtained, with less coma than
with chloroform or ether, the speedy recovery from its effects,
less nauseating, and less headache and rigidity and struggling
than in the case of ether or chloroform. Others, however,
have not been so much impressed with this anaesthetic agent as
was Dr. Snow ; hence, it has not been regarded with the same
favor as other agents of this class. An extreme quantity being
required to produce complete insensibility to pain, its operation
is considered to be dangerous.