354 
THE AUSTRALASIAN JOURNAL OF PHARMACY. 
compulsory vaccination may be found in a comparison of the systems adopted 
respectively in Germany and France. In 1885 the deaths from small-pox in 21 
German towns, having an aggregate population of 4,306,933, amounted to 27, 
while in 15 French towns where vaccination is not obligatory, and whose aggregate 
population is 4,200,840, the deaths from the same cause in the same period reached 
a total of 866, 32 times more than in the larger German population. These facts, 
and others equally significant, will be found fully set forth in a work by the 
distinguished statistician, Doctor Jassens, recently published at Brussels. — B. and 
C. Drug. 
Bcsixcj on Critic; If JSorlotjr Rloetwas. 
At a meeting of the council of the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain 
on 7th July, a discussion arose on the costs of prosecutions under the Pharmacy 
Act, during which the president admitted that for every £5 recovered the 
society were actually £1(3 out of pocket — in other words, that it cost £15 to 
recover £5. One case was mentioned where it cost £45 to recover £3. 
At the same meeting the House committee reported that, having carefully 
considered the desirability of extending the usefulness of the society’s official 
organ, they had come to the conclusion that it was not expedient to increase the 
size or to make any alteration in the character of the Journal. The report 
was adversely criticised by several members, but was eventually adopted. 
The report presented at the sixth annual meeting of the Society of Chemical 
Industry, held at Liverpool in July, showed that the society now contains 
2271 members. Since the previous meeting 266 members had been elected, and 
86 had been lost by death. The council expressed a hope that the existing 
depression among the chemical industries may soon pass away, and that the 
work which the society has been formed to achieve may bear fruit in the 
shape of increased prosperity to existing industries, and the establishment of 
new manufactures. 
At a recent meeting of the Board of Examiners for Scotland a resolution 
was adopted expressing “the great satisfaction with which they have learned that it 
has pleased her Majesty to confer the honour of Knighthood on Sir Douglas 
Maclagan,” a dignity which they regarded as “a singularly fitting and appropriate 
recognition of the varied abilities and attainments by which Sir Douglas has, 
throughout a long and brilliant career, shed fresh lustre on his profession, and 
enhanced the name and the fame of the Edinburgh School of Medicine.” 
At a meeting of the council of the Pharmaceutical Society in July, the 
president read a letter which had been received from Mr. Bosisto, acknowledging 
the resolution passed in June, and expressing the hope that friendly relations 
would always subsist between the home society and the daughter society in 
Victoria. At the same meeting a letter was read from the president and registrar 
of the Pharmacy Board of Victoria, introducing Mr. Bowen, president of the 
Pharmaceutical Society of Australasia. The president mentioned that Mr. Bowen 
had arrived before the receipt of the letter, and that he had the honour of 
welcoming him to London. 
Among the donations acknowledged by the librarian at a recent meeting 
of the council of the Pharmaceutical Society we note the following : — “ Mueller 
(Baron F. Von), ‘Select Extra-tropical Plants,’ new Victorian edition, 1885. 
From J. Bosisto, Esq., M.P., on behalf of the Victorian Boyal Commission.” 
At the same meeting an application from the Pharmacy Board of Queensland 
for the Pharmaceutical Journal and a copy of the Kegister was directed to be 
complied with. 
