46 
THE AUSTRALASIAN JOURNAL OF PHARMACY. 
larger, the yield of the drug and dye or tan-material from our plant would be 
much larger, provided that the contents of Catechin and Catechu-Acid should 
also prove rich. 
W. Hunter’s illustration of U. Gambir in Vol. IX., pi. 22, of the 
Linnean Society is a fair one, precisely reiterated in Hayne’s Arzney-Gewiichse 
X., 3. Better still is the picture of that plant in Bentley’s and Trimen’s 
Medicinal Plants, part 7, numb. 139. From that work and from Fluckiger and 
Hanbury’s Pharmacography, p. 298-301, ready information might be gained, 
concerning the simple mode of preparing the Gambir or pale Catechu, as 
well as the places and extent of export. One other Uncaria is extant as Papuan, 
the IT. appendiculata from Dutch Hew Guinea ; but it is not closely similar to 
our plant. In bestowing on the latter now the name of Dr. Bernays, the surgeon 
of Captain Everill’s Expedition, I would bear public testimony to the skill and 
zeal displayed by him in seeing the whole party back from such a fever-region 
in safety, the medicinal value of this Uncaria likely enhancing to him this parti- 
cular identification of his name with the Papuan flora. 
ANALYTICAL PRACTICE FOR STUDENTS. 
By J. B. Lillie Mackay, Graduate of King's College , London ; late Demon - 
strator of Practical Chemistry at the Royal School of Mines , London . 
A knowledge of chemical analysis cannot be attained with any degree of accuracy 
or proficiency without direct observation at the bench of a well-appointed labora- 
tory under the direction of an efficient teacher, for no amount of book learning 
will enable a student to become an expert in the testing even of simple salts, 
not to speak of the complex mixtures that may be presented to a candidate for 
examination. On the other hand, ocular demonstration and rule of thumb 
practice will not alone produce any great skill, unless the student thoroughly 
comprehends the nature of the reactions that take place in experimental work, or 
realise the changes that are likely to occur by the use of certain re-agents. To 
follow to the letter the instructions given in the analytical schemes in any 
standard work on Qualitative Analysis, without knowing the why and the 
wherefore , is little better than monotonous routine— in fact, a sort of mechanical 
drudgery. Such knowledge, in most cases, evaporates with the cessation of the 
practice. The mason may place in regular rows his blocks of stone to 
erect the wall of a house according to the builder’s plan submitted 
to him, but he cannot, unless he be an architect, design a building 
that would stand the ravages of time. So, also, the student of chemistry 
may recognise the presence of a metal or an acidulous radical by formulated 
experimental test, or in a haphazard manner arrive at a correct result 
although based on erroneous deductions. But that is not sufficient to give him 
confidence in his own efforts. He ought to be capable of devising schemes for 
himself, which he can easily do from observation of analogies or contrasts in 
the behaviour of chemical substances when acted on by different re-agents. 
Such schemes or tables are constructed upon a knowledge of the properties of 
the chemical elements and their various combinations; and it therefore behoves 
all who wish to excel in analytical practice to possess an elementary acquaintance 
with theoretical chemistry, and subsequently obtain an adequate grasp .of the 
principles of the science by the performance of tests in the laboratory. Pupils 
who have no conversance with simple chemical facts make but slow progress 
