Coca plant from Java

The coca plant is an evergreen, native to South America, particularly the countries of Peru, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile and Columbia, and should not be confused with the cocoa plant, from which chocolate is made. Although the coca plant is natural to South America, it has been successfully cultivated in Java, West Indies, India and Australia. 

Belonging to the same chemical group as atropine is the important alkaloid cocaine, C17H21O4N. It is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant, Erythroxylon coca, which grows in South America (Bolivia and Peru) and in Java and Ceylon. Distinction should be made between the coca plant and the cacao bean from which cocoa and chocolate are made. 

Much of the cocaine used in this country is prepared from the crude alkaloid which is manufactured in the countries where the plant grows. The alkaloids are extracted from the leaves by kerosene or some other cheap immiscible solvent in the presence of an alkali, the alkaloids being separated from the solvent with dilute sulphuric acid from which cocaine is precipitated by sodium carbonate. This crude substance represents about 90 per cent, of cocaine. A good deal of cocaine is manufactured in Germany from the Java coca leaves which contain chiefly cinnamyl cocaine. This alkaloid is hydrolized by boiling with diluted hydrochloric acid and the ecgonine so obtained treated with benzoic anhydride and methyl iodide. The other coca bases may also be converted into cocaine by a similar process as suggested by Liebermann (B. Chem. G., 1888, xxi, 3196). 

---