The latex is therefore usually allowed to coagulate on the tree, as it slowly exudes from the incision.
Gallic acid does not coagulate albumen when used externally.
In some districts the collected milk is heated alone or diluted with water, to coagulate the rubber, but if heated alone an inferior rubber is apt to result owing to overheating.
The cups when full are poured into a larger vessel, and solution of alum is added to coagulate the latex.
All these salts are mild astringents when applied externally, as they coagulate the albumen of the tissues and of any discharge which may be present.
The action of the moderate heat, 210° F., on the limed juice causes the albumen in it to coagulate; this rising to the surface collects the cachazas, which form and float thereon.
In virtue of this property they are also mild haemostatics, tending to coagulate the albumens of the blood and thereby to arrest haemorrhage.
Applied externally lead salts have practically no action upon the unbroken skin, but applied to sores, ulcers or any exposed mucous membranes they coagulate the albumen in the tissues themselves and contract the small vessels.
Apart from increased yield in sugar of good quality, we may sum up the advantages procurable from the use of Hatton defecators as follows: cold liming; heating gently to the temperature required to coagulate the albumen and not beyond it, whereby disturbance would ensue; the continuous separation of the scums; the gradual drying of the scums so as to make them ready for the fields, without carrying away juice or requiring treatment in filter presses; and the continuous supply of hot defecated juice to the evaporators, without the use of subsiding tanks or eliminators; and, finally, the saving in expenditure on plant, such as filter presses, &c., and wages.
Medicinally, gallic acid has been, and is still, largely used as an astringent, styptic and haemostatic. Gallic acid, however, does not coagulate albumen and therefore possesses no local astringent action.
Externally, it is not absorbed by the unbroken skin, but when applied to the broken skin, sores, ulcers and mucous surfaces, the ferric salts are powerful astringents, because they coagulate the albuminous fluids in the tissues themselves.
The acid not only takes up water, but it acts on the suspended impurities, carbonizing them to some extent, and thus causing them to coagulate and fall down in the form of a flocculent mass, which carries with it mechanically other impurities which have not been acted upon.
