1890.] MICEOSCOPIOAL JOUENAL. 153 



The Use of the Simple Microscope in Pharmacy. 



By H. M. WHELPLEY, M. D., Ph. G. 



That the microscope is a valuable aid to the pharmacist in the dis- 

 charge of his duties is no longer a question of doubt. The fact that all 

 the leading colleges of pharmacy have special departments for teaching 

 how to manipulate the microscope is sufficient evidence that it is one 

 of the essentials in a well-regulated drug store. 



The important question and the one which interests the average drug- 

 gist is the selection of a suitable instrument and the learning how to 

 use it to the greatest advantage. To the making of diflerent styles of 

 microscopes (like the publication of books) there is no end. Up to the 

 present time, however, there is no microscope especially designed for 

 the use of pharmacists. We have instruments for physicians, special 

 ones for chemists, for mineralogists, and for botanists, as well as those 

 for the examination of writing, such as signatures, etc. Fabric makers 

 have microscopes so arranged that they can readily count the number 

 of threads to a given space. Instruments have been devised for class 

 demonstrations and others for the entertainment of the laity, while the 

 celebrated Griffith Club Microscope is so arranged that it is readily 

 portable, and one can always have a first-class instrument with him 

 without the inconvenience of handling the ordinary patterns which are 

 unhandy when it comes to travelling. There is a microscope for' the 

 special purpose of examining skin diseases, while another instrument 

 is arranged to inspect the contents of an aquarium. We have trichino- 

 scopes for the detection of trichina spiralis in pork. But no one has 

 gotten up a microscope which is essentially a druggist's instrument. 

 The demands of pharmacy do not call for a pattern which shall mate- 

 rially difter from all others. More than one instrument has been ad- 

 vertised as being '' specially adapted to the use of pharmacists," but the 

 same instruments are also " specially adapted to the use of physicians," 

 and are in reality only ordinary microscopes. 



The microscope enables us to see objects which we cannot perceive 

 with the unaided eye. In doing so it enables us to see either very small 

 objects or very small portions of large ones. On account of this power 

 of the microscope to bring us close to the objects some one has proposed 

 to call it an engiscope, a word which signifies to see at a short distance, 

 but the new term has not met v/ith a hearty reception. 



All microscopes, whether great or small, plain or complicated, are di- 

 vided into two classes. This division is made on purely optical grounds. 

 Microscopes are either simple or compound. A simple microscope is 

 one with which we look directly at the object and see it in its normal 

 position (provided it is not distorted in view on account of the micro- 

 scope being a very poor one). A simple microscope may consist of 

 one or any number of lenses, but when there are more than one we 

 look through all of them directly at the object. As an illustration we 

 may look at a stigma of Spanish saffron under a simple microscope 

 and the cleft end of the stigma will appear in the same position that it 

 actually occupies. 



A simple microscope may be very simple in its parts or may con- 

 tain a complication of apparatus equal in complexity to some of the 

 patent suppository moulds. 



