Cbe Journal of Pharmacology. 



A Monthly Journal Devoted to the Advances Made in the Various Departments of 



Materia Medica. 



Vol. V. APRIL, 1898. No. 4. 



SUBSCRIPTION PRICE, INCi UDING POSTAGE: 

 Per Annum » $1.00. — Single Copies 15 Cents 



Subscriptions, address Nelson S. Kirk, 640 Madison Ave., New York City. 



Business Communications, address D. E. Austin, 115 W. 68th St., New York City. 



Original Contributions, Exchanges, Books for Review and Editorial Communications: 

 Address S^ITH ELY JELLIFFE, H D., 231 West 71st Street, New York City. 



Edited by SMITH ELY JELLIFFFE, A.B., M.D. 



WITH THE COLLABORATION OF 



Chas. Rice, Ph.D. H. H. Rusby, M.D. V. Coblentz, Ph.D. Geo. A. Ferguson, Ph. B 

 Geo. C. Diekman, M.D. H. B. Ferguson. Phar. D. 



EDITORIAL. 



MATERIA MEDICA AND THE DOCTOR. 



There was a day, in the dart ages, when the physician went out into the 

 woods and fields and collected his own herhs and roots. He brought them 

 home and dried them, distilled their properties out in mystic fashion, some- 

 times with the aid of an incantation, and always at the proper phase of the 

 moon that the drug required for its special efficacy. 



A; the present day, in the bright light of science, the physician sits 

 at his office disk, and scrawls a well-worn formula on a scrap of paper, and 

 commends it to the care of his patient; or, taking from a set of numbered 

 vials a nill whose particular numeral is calculated to allay the pangs of that 

 particular patient, he leaves it by his bedside, confident that he has shown 

 a. discrimination in his treatment of the case that is as up-to-date as the 

 proprietary production he is prescribing. 



Materia medica is a thing of the past. An intimate knowledge of drugs, 

 of the barks and roots they come from, of their chemical constituents and 

 of their physiological effect is virtually unknown to the average practicing 

 ohysician. 



He wants to press the button, and have the right remedy for the disease- 

 drop out of the slot, all nicely prepared in palatable form, lie is the "prac- 

 tical" man, the man that believes in making use of all quick roads to sue- 



