PHARMACEUTICAL LEGISLATION. 
33 
grounds to publicity, viz. the want of proper payment for our skill, time, and 
labour. It is true that, in general, we get a large profit on the cost of our goods, 
but this, however large, is no more a sufficient remuneration for our services than 
it would be for a joiner or shoemaker only to charge a profit on the articles 
they consume. It is a remarkable fact, that while all this description of arti¬ 
sans charge “ stuff and time,” the latter being the principal charge, chemists 
generally fail to make a competent income by entirely overlooking the value 
of their time, training, skill, and education, and charge only, as a rule, for the 
value of the medicines. The.consequence is that, as a class, they are less 
prosperous than almost any other body of men, while their duties require the 
most arduous attention, and their occupation is of the most wasting and toil¬ 
some character. The young chemist commences business with large and 
promising profits ; he looks upon the neighbouring tradesmen, and contem¬ 
plates an infinite advantage over them ; but, before he has been many years 
in business, he finds out his sad mistake. Their goods are in large and con¬ 
stant demand, and require little preparatory study, labour, or preparation ; 
while every pennyworth he has to sell requires not only all these, but he is 
obliged to furnish an amount of information with much that he sells which, 
at the hands of a lawyer or other professional man, would be charged,—an 
amount sufficient to make a chemist’s fortune ten times over. Take a simple 
case. A lady complained to me that I had overcharged her in charging two¬ 
pence for a powder (in prescription I charge threepence or fourpence), and 
that she could get a grey powder for one penny ? during the time I served 
her, she asked me more than twenty questions in relation to the powder and 
the complaint. I calculated the time altogether, and convinced her that she 
had been an expense to me by coming into the shop— that in cost, in prepa¬ 
ration, in articles, and in rent, rates, taxes, and wages, Iliad spent more while 
she was in the shop than her powder came to. For many years I charged pow¬ 
ders Is. per doz. ; pills, 4 d. do.; mixtures, 3 or 4 oz., 8 d. ; 6 and 8 oz., Is. 
and Is. 4 <d. The last few years, myself and many neighbouring chemists 
have charged one-third to one-half more, especially on the smaller items ; and 
I am fully convinced that these prices generally should be doubled ; and if 
large quantities are required, in cases of long illness, a suitable discount 
made off the bills according to amount. Some customers have been lost, 
others have complained of the charges, but, on the whole, the change has 
been much easier than I thought at first possible, and the impression on the 
amount returned has been very decided. Chemists have only to be a little 
more united as to a scale of charges, and the public will not be found so un¬ 
reasonable as is generally supposed. 
I am, Sir, yours faithfully, 
A Founder. 
PHAKMACEUTICAL LEGISLATION. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL. 
Sir,—Having on former occasions taken a somewhat prominent part in the 
discussion of pharmaceutical politics, I feel that I ought not now to neglect 
publicly expressing the satisfaction with which I view the general tenor of the 
Bill now before the Society. I have not hesitated, in the organ of the outsiders, 
to attack what I conceived to be one-sided views of its contributors, and I 
should not now refrain from protesting against anything like selfish or narrow¬ 
minded policy on the part of our own members. Self-interest has been much 
too prominent in the letters of several of your recent correspondents. The 
question “ how it affects me ” is one unworthy of being introduced into the con¬ 
sideration of any measure for the public good. 
VOL. IX. 
D 
