The Microscope. 55 



Indies, and was of special interest from the fact that it contained 

 Navicula Durandii, a form recently discovered and named in honor 

 of Mr. Durand, who visited the San Francisco Society some months 

 ago on his way to Australia. A. H. Breckenfeld, Rec. Sec'y. 



EDITORIAL 



WHAT PRACTICAL USE CAN THE DRUGGIST MAKE OF 

 THE MICROSCOPE ? 



The importance of this query to the practicing pharmacist can 

 hardly be over-estimated. In the first place, it is absolutely essen- 

 tial that the druggist who would know anything of botany and of 

 the plants from which the medicines are made which it is his busi- 

 ness to dispense, should have a knowledge of the structure of plant 

 tissues. Prof. Prescott, in a recent valuable article makes this one 

 of the necessary qualifications, also, to an understanding of "the 

 descriptive terms by which vegetable drugs are defined," and "by 

 which to identify drugs in powder." Unfortunately there are in 

 pharmacy, as in other professions, too many to whom the use of the 

 microscope as an educational instrument makes little or no appeal. 



There is, however, another side to this question which is of 

 greater interest to the public, and of pecuniary importance to the 

 pharmacist. The retailer may be over-honest, but this has not 

 always been found to be the case with manufacturers and importers, 

 and powders, leaves, roots, etc., for which the highest market price 

 has been paid have often proved to be inert and worse than useless, 

 if not positively injiu'ious to the consumer. Drug adulteration is no 

 new "trick of the trade," for Pliny, Vitruvius and others of the 

 Latin writers, speak of its practice in their day, and of the tests then 

 employed. As the knowledge of medicinal plants increased, the 

 ingenuity of the human brain was taxed to keep pace in this fraudu- 

 lent practice, until, as early as the thirteenth century, recourse was 

 had to legislation to restrain dealers from cheating each other and 

 the public. At the present time laws are in force in every civilized 

 land prohibiting the adulteration of drugs and food stuffs; but that 

 the evil has not been wholly stamped out in our own country is well- 

 known, and it is asserted that in England, Germany, Belgium and 

 France, there are still establishments which prepare such drugs with 

 especial reference to the American market. In" view of these facts, it 

 becomes the imperative duty of every pharmacist to protect himself 

 by testing all crude drugs that come into his possession. And how 

 can this best be done ? Assuredly not by chemistry, which is not 



