PHARMACEUTICAL LEG!SLATION. 
89 
to return to the state of confusion from which we have now partially succeeded 
in extricating ourselves,—and that, too, against the protests of a large propor¬ 
tion of the present members. 
Tho. B. Groves, M.P.S., F.C.S. 
Weymouth, July 12th, 1867. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL. 
Sir,—By so far abler pens than mine has every semblance of propriety been 
argued out of Mr. Mills’s views on the subject of trade legislation, that I shall 
not be surprised if you reject my answer to his second letter as unnecessary. 
But the outsiders are so personally alluded to, that to prove we shrink not from 
argument or discussion, I would occupy your space for a brief and last reply. 
Mr. Mills no longer proclaims himself the champion for non-legislation; he 
has, with the zeal of a convert, himself sketched out a clause for our Bill. We 
doubted not he would discern, on further considering the subject, that Parlia¬ 
ment, impelled by public opinion (ever sensitive on that ugly word poison), and 
too impatient to await that end which “ appeared,” as he expressed it, u to be gra¬ 
dually approaching,” would, in introducing a Bill of its own, regard the Phar¬ 
maceutical Society merely as a voluntary body, and legislate accordingly to place 
it in a position far inferior to that we are now striving it should occupy. 
The details of legislation affecting different present interests must be founded 
on compromise. We, the outsiders, have said to the Pharmaceutical Council, 
we confide our interests to you, and on the faith of our mutual understanding 
are prepared to consider, for political purposes, our organization unnecessary. 
I never intimated (as Mr. Mills has quoted me) that we were so anxious to break 
up our organization. The Pharmaceutical Society and the outsiders are thus 
in accord to regulate admission to the trade in future (not at the present, as 
Mr. Mills quotes me,—thus I simply deny the truth of his dictum, that so long 
as I am admitted I care nought for others), and, as I said in my last, to give 
the Pharmaceutical Society the monopoly of such induction. 
We contend this is a broad principle, one which justly appeals to what¬ 
ever public spirit we possess; and we, the outsiders, were not prepared to look 
in vain through Mr. Mills’s epistolary productions to discover a trace of that 
ambition for his Society’s future, such as we should expect to find expressed by 
a man who has had expended on him a liberal education. However much I 
may admire the vigour of Mr. Mills’s style, your readers cannot compliment 
him upon any comprehensive grasp of his subject. He begins his reply to me 
in words that would fitly introduce the hero of an epic. Of course he is speak¬ 
ing of himself, and he says, “When I was younger I aspired to the highest 
honours,” and he concludes by talking honour at me, on the subject of that 
examination and training of which he is so brilliant an example. Thus his 
Alpha is “ L’etat c’est moihis Omega “ L’etat c’est toi.” 
Many shrewd men would be tempted to smile at this style of argument, and 
it has not convinced the outsiders who differ in toto from Mr. Mills. They 
hold the opinion, that the Pharmacy Act is not proposed to affect personally 
either your correspondent or your humble servant; but (let it be repeated once 
more) to elevate the trade, and place the Pharmaceutical Society in its legiti¬ 
mate position to effect it. 
I said we were not a few clamorous outsiders, because we represented the larger 
proportion of chemists and druggists; and Mr. Mills whips me with the rejoinder 
that we cannot represent any great number, and thus are justly snubbed as a 
few clamorous outsiders, because 500 at the utmost will subscribe to the Pharma- 
