NovEMBER I, 1906] 
NATURE 3 
state of our knowledge perhaps a classification based 
upon such principles is the most satisfactory. The 
matter is, however, one of considerable difficulty, as 
nearly all drugs exert many physiological actions not 
always differing only in degree, but in some cases 
actually in kind. It is, from the nature of the case, 
therefore obligatory to take one action of a drug as 
determining its position in one or other group. As 
an instance we may cite caffeine. Dr. Dixon places 
this drug by virtue of its action in the group of 
diuretics; if we, however, follow the text we find 
that considerable space is of necessity devoted to the 
other, almost equally important, actions of this 
alkaloid. 
It is difficult in a review of ordinary dimensions 
to do adequate justice to a work of this character, 
and in the remarks which follow we shall confine our- 
selves to a few salient points which strike us as being 
likely to interest the medical and general scientific 
reader. In the first place, it seems that on account 
of the entire absence of all reference to original litera- 
ture the book is not intended to be a bool: of refer- 
ence; further, the absence of information with regard 
to pharmacological technique obviously places the bool: 
in the library rather than in the laboratory. As the 
author states clearly in his preface, several of the 
facts are new, and doubtful statements have been 
verified by experiments performed in his own labor- 
atory. In this connection we must say at once that 
the reader will have carefully to consider the magni- 
tude of the evidence with regard to these new facts 
and verifications of doubtful ones. The therapeutics 
included in Dr. Dixon’s work are only such as to 
illustrate the pharmacology; from this it clearly 
follows that the book is not intended for those engaged 
in the practice of medicine. Materia medica is only 
briefly dealt with, although in many cases very 
abstruse details and complicated formule with regard 
to the chemical composition of substances, such, for 
instance, as hydrastine, are given. We think such 
details cannot be of use to the ordinary student of 
pharmacology, and to be of any value to the pharma- 
cological or chemical worker should be accompanied 
by a reference to the literature from which they are 
derived; and here we will observe that although in 
his pretace the author mentions a list of standard 
works dealing with pharmacology and materia 
medica to which he is indebted, all reference, so far 
as we can find, to books dealing with the question 
of the chemical composition and reactions of, for 
instance, the alkaloids and their derivatives is 
omitted. 
The first thirty-eight pages of the book are 
devoted to general considerations, amongst which 
perhaps the most attractive is a discussion of the 
relation between physiological action and chemical 
constitution. This interesting subject is treated at 
some length, and most of the important facts bear- 
ing upon it are carefully considered. Under the 
heading of the standardisation of drugs, the author 
discusses the question of physiological standardisation. 
He rightly directs attention to the extreme difficulty 
of standardising certain preparations according to 
NO:mrOgm, VOL. 75)| 
their chemical content, and we entirely agree that, in 
the case of certain drugs, standardisation of a physio- 
logical type should be adopted; that is, different pre- 
parations should be compared with regard to their 
action upon a constant tissue unit. Such a method 
has been successfully adopted, under even more com- 
plicated conditions, in the comparison of the relative 
toxicity of certain sera. We must confess, however, 
that we are in this connection somewhat surprised to 
read that the cardiac glucosides can be standardised 
by perfusing the isolated rabbit’s heart with Ringer’s 
solution and subsequently adding the drug. The 
author must either be under some misconception with 
regard to the composition of Ringer’s solution or be 
in possession of important facts which, so far as we 
are aware, he has not published. 
From chapter iii. on, the book is devoted to de- 
scriptions of the characters, preparations, and physio- 
logical actions of the official, and some important un- 
official, remedies and drugs. The action of each drug 
is most exhaustively considered, and in most cases 
illustrated by one or more curves, the result in the 
vast majority of cases of the author’s own experi- 
mentation. The amount of space devoted to these 
curves is certainly a feature of the work, and renders 
to it, at least from one point of view, a unique value; 
as, however, usually no discussion of the conditions 
of the experiment accompanies the curves, the reader 
has too often to take upon trust the conclusions based 
upon them. 
The mass of the pharmacology of the more purely 
inorganic substances is prefaced by a short but com- 
plete discussion of salt action and some of the chief 
bearings of modern physical chemistry upon pharma- 
cological action. 
The final chapter of the book is devoted to ferments, 
vegetable toxins, internal secretions, serum-therapy, 
and antagonism. The work concludes with an ex- 
haustive index. 
Dr. Dixon’s ‘‘ Manual”? is certainly an important 
addition to standard pharmacological literature, and if 
in our opinion its educational value, taken as a 
whole, is less than that of certain of its contempor- 
aries, this is to some extent due to the curious posi- 
tion its subject-matter holds in the complicated 
medical education of to-day. We have no hesitation 
in saying that it should be possessed by every pharma- 
cologist and pharmacological laboratory, if only as 
containing a number of original experimental results 
worthy of control and further investigation. 
A PIONEER IN BIOLOGY. 
Jan Ingen-Housz. Sein Leben und sein Wirken als 
Naturforscher und Arzt. By Prof. Julius Wiesner. 
Unter Mitwirkung von Prof. Dr. Th. Escherich, 
Prof. E. Mach, Prof. R. von Toply, und Prof. 
Wegscheider. Pp. x+252. (Vienna: C. Kowegen, 
1905.) 
R. WIESNER relates that on his becoming pro- 
fessor of plant physiology in the University of 
Vienna, more than thirty years ago, he resolved to 
become familiar with the work of the founders of 
that science. Soon he became peculiarly interested in 
