March, 1882. 
THE CHEMIST AND DRUGGIST. 
85 
occasion to the phytographic record of the new plant. The 
discovery is due to Mr. Eugene Fitzalan, of Port Denison, 
whose name has become quite famed through the manifold 
additions made by him to the knowledge of the north- 
east Australian flora, and whose attention I had particularly 
directed to a closer inquiry into the various specific forms of 
palms and cycads of his district. The new researches were 
again carried out by that gentleman with much discrimina- 
tion and zeal. 
Cycas Kennedy ana. 
Stem tall ; leaves very numerous ; leaf-stalks elongated, 
nearly glabrous, only on their upper part armed with a few 
spines ; rachis by a single slight curvature gently flexuous, 
ascendant ; leaf-segments about one hundred on each side, 
broad-linear, nearly flat, acute and somewhat pungent, rather 
glaucous on the under page, shining on the surface, glabrous 
on both sides; all segments, but particularly those towards the 
summit, decurrent ; the lowest nearly half as long as the 
middle segments, and not gradually abbreviated into mere 
spines ; male amentum rather large, oval-ellipsoid, the 
antheriferous portion of its scales narrowly wedge-shaped, 
about three times as long as the deltoid, truncated , completely 
velvet-downy, entirely straight and never pointed terminal 
dilatation ; bare upper side of the antheriferous portion 
of the scales quite glabrous ; anther-cells extending to the 
base of the scales, not grouped by any empty space into two 
areas ; fruit-amentum very large ; stipes of the scales mode- 
rately elongated, as well as their rachis velvet-downy ; ovules 
or fruits on each rachis always only four ; nuts nearly globular, 
perfectly glabrous. 
In the Normanby- Ranges, near Port Denison ; Eugene 
Fitzalan, Esq. 
This new pine-palm is dedicated to His Excellency Sir 
Arthur Kennedy, G.C.M.G., who for thirty years held the 
highly distinguished position of Her Majesty’s representative 
in several British colonies, and who now presides over the 
wide and rich dominions of Queensland. Two other species 
of cycas, indigenous only to tropical Eastern Australia, were 
discovered successively during the governorships there of the 
Marquis of Normanby, G.C.M.G., and of Sir William Cairns, 
K.C.M.G., and were dedicated at the time to these high dig- 
nitaries, with a view of connecting their honoured names 
also in botanical science with the colony, over which they then 
ruled. 
Cycas Cairnsiana is easily distinguished from C. Kennedy- 
ana by the more spiny leaf-stalks, by the narrower leaf- 
segments with somewhat recurved margins and pale surface, 
by considerably smaller antheriferous scales with propor- 
tionately larger terminal plate, and by nearly glabrous 
fruit-stalks with only two nuts. 
Cycas Normanbyana differs already from C. Kennedyana in 
simply arcuate raches of the leaves, and in fruit-stalks never 
bearing more than two nuts. 
Cycas media is easily separated from C. Kennedyana by 
the straight raches of the leaves, and by the fruit-stalks pro- 
ducing always more than four and often eight ovules and nuts. 
But, irrespective of these distinctive notes, all three are still 
more marked in difference by the ascendant, sharp-pointed 
apex of the antheriferous scales, which in C. Kennedyana is 
entirely absent. Indeed, by the last-mentioned characteristic 
the new species is also at once separated from the very limited 
number of South Asiatic and Polynesian congeners, hitherto 
rendered descriptively known. 
NOTES OF THE YEAR 1881. 
We extract the following more interesting passages from the 
“Review of the year 1881,” which appeared in the Pharmaceu- 
tical Journal ; — 
There has been evidence of a growing opinion that the time 
has come when the question of branch pharmacies should also 
be dealt with. As to the desirability of such a course as soon 
as the time is ripe there can hardly be two opinions, for on 
several occasions when the society has had to go into a law 
court to prevent an unregistered person from carrying on a 
chemist’s business with the aid of a qualified assistant, the 
fact that a registered person can carry on any number of 
branch shops without employing qualified assistants has evi- 
dently appeared as an anomaly to the judges and unfavour- 
ably affected their judgments. 
A bill was also introduced into the House of Lords, and 
eventually passed, to amend the law relating to veterinary 
surgeons. It provided for the establishment of a register 
and of examinations as a test of qualification for registration, 
under the control of the Royal College of Veterinary Sur- 
geons, and it made it penal for any unregistered person, after 
31st December, to use any title or description implying that 
he is qualified to practise veterinary surgery, but it provided 
for the registration without examination of such persons as 
had for five years continuously next before the passing of 
the Act practised veterinary surgery in the United Kingdom. 
There have been reported during the year several cases of 
prosecution under both the fifteenth and seventeenth sections 
of the Pharmacy Act, the former at the instance of the Coun- 
cil of the Pharmaceutical Society as represented by the Regis- 
trar under the Act, and most of the latter at the instance of 
the Trade Association. The cases that are carried into court 
do not of course represent the full number of offenders against 
the Act that are dealt with, the object sought, the cessation 
of the offence, being frequently attained without the necessity 
of having recourse to legal proceedings. In one of the cases 
reported a point of some importance was decided, as to 
whether a trader could sell to the public poisons supplied to 
him by a duly qualified chemist and druggist, bearing on the 
label the name and address of the chemist and druggist, but 
not that of the owner of the shop in which the poisons were 
sold. The defendant, an unregistered person, who kept a 
general shop in Oxford, admitted a sale of red precipitate, but 
contended that the chemist and druggist whose name and ad- 
dress were on the label was his tenant in respect of one of the 
windows of his shop and that he, in the sale of drugs and 
poisons, only acted as an agent. The Oxford magistrates, be- 
fore whom the case first came for hearing, admitted this plea 
and dismissed the summons. It was evident, however, that 
if this decision were allowed to remain unchallenged, another 
serious rent would have been made in the Pharmacy Act, 
especially as it was candidly admitted that the multiplication 
of such agencies was contemplated. The Executive of the 
Trade Association, who had commenced the prosecution, 
therefore took the necessary steps for an appeal, which was 
heard in the Queen’s Bench Division before Mr. Justice Grove 
and Mr. Justice Lopes. At first the judges were inclined to 
consider the point as one of fact which lay with the magis- 
trates to determine, but after further argument were of opinion 
that the magistrates had not drawn a proper inference from 
the facts before them. They held that it was contemplated 
throughout the seventeenth section that the seller should be 
the person actually conducting business at the shop where the 
sale takes place, and that a person living at a distance from 
the place of sale could not comply, for instance, with the pro- 
visions as to the entry of the sale of poisons in the poison- 
book. They were also of opinion that the Act could be evaded 
if the word “seller” were construed to mean other than the 
person who actually conducted the business of a shop. The 
bearing of this upon the question of branch businesses con- 
ducted by unqualified assistants is obvious. 
A considerable number of cases of death by poisoning have 
been recorded during the past year, and the circumstances 
attendant upon several of them are of particular interest at a 
time when amendment of the Pharmacy Act is contemplated. 
The number of deaths resulting from the taking of patent 
medicines containing poisons, especially the narcotic prepara- 
tions so widely advertised and used, has attracted attention to 
the incautious manner in which they are supplied to the public. 
This has frequently provoked remonstrance from coroners 
and juries, and the Privy Council has, on more than one occa- 
sion, been moved to commend the consideration of the subject 
to the Council of the Pharmaceutical Society. Although the 
Privy Council declined to adopt the result of such considera- 
tion as presented in the form of the draft bill, there can be no 
doubt that the present state of public opinion with respect to 
the supply of poisons furnishes a favourable opportunity of 
dealing with the subject. The careless manner in which car- 
bolic acid and other disinfectants are left unlabelled or other- 
wise distinguished has also been the cause of several fatalities. 
Some valuable investigations of vegetable substances have 
been published. Dr. Hesse has examined quebracho bark, and 
found that it does not contain a trace of his paytine, the 
alkaloid with which Dr. Wulfsberg had suggested Fraude’s 
aspidospermime was.identical. He mentions, however, having 
separated four other alkaloids, besides aspidospermime, one, 
which he has named “ quebrachine,” being present in the 
bark in larger quantity than that alkaloid. As it is admitted 
that Fraude’s alkaloid is frequently not presented by commer- 
cial aspidospermime, the details of Dr. Hesse’s results, which 
will shortly appear in Liebig's Annalen , will be welcome. 
The same indefatigable chemist has supplemented his investi- 
