130 THE ALUMNI J(3URNAL 



BOOK REVIEWS. 



A Compcnd of Materia Mcdica, Therapeutics and Prescription 

 Writing. By Samuel O. L. Potter, M. D., M. R. C. P. Lond. P. 

 Blakeston's eSr Co., 1012 Walnut St., Phila., Pa. Cloth. P. P. 

 292, $1.00. 



This ready and concise treatise has especial reference to the phy- 

 siological action of drugs, is based on the eighth revision of the U. 

 S. P. and includes many unofficial remedies besides. 



The book has already passed through six editions, this being the 

 seventh revised and enlarged. 



Twelve new articles and forty-three new paragraphs on important 

 drugs have been inserted, and sixteen articles have been rewritten. 

 All obsolete matter has been removed, but the insertion of so much 

 new matter, and the adoption of a wider face type, have added thirty- 

 seven pages to the book. The new matter has reference to Animal 

 Extracts, Boric Acid, Ethyl Chloride, Formaldehyde, Methylene 

 Blue, Musk, Oxygen Senega, Sera, Sumbol, Uric acid Eliminants, 

 and Urinary Sedatives. 



The newer remedies are discussed at length and the text is so ar- 

 ranged and indexed that any subject may be consulted with read- 

 iness and convenience. While the book is intended primarily for 

 medical students, yet students of pharmacy, clerks and pharmacists 

 in general will find it an important adjunct to their library. 

 Especially is the book to be commended to those preparing for col- 

 lege or state board examinations. 



SNAKE-BITE REMEDY. 



This time, according to the Montreal Pharmaceutical Journal, it is 

 just the common, broad-leaved, dooryard plantain, Plantago major Lin. 

 The modus operandi is to apply a poultice of the leaves to the bite and 

 to chew a few leaves, swallowing the juice. Presumably the green leaf 

 is preferred. It is said that this remedy was discovered by a colored 

 boy who had been watching a fight between a rattlesnake and a mon- 

 goose ; every time the mongoose was bitten it left the rattler to eat a 

 few plantain leaves, when it would return to the fight. We give it for 

 what it is worth. 



