NOTICE FROM THE MEDICAL COUNCIL. 
509 
lowed the British Pharmacopoeia, unless “ P. L.” was written on the prescrip¬ 
tion. 
Mr. Waugh asked whether, in that case, they did not often dispense with a 
little doubt, hoping they might be right? 
Mr. Hills said that by following the Pharmacopoeia, which was authorized 
by law, they had, at all events, the law on their side. 
Mr. Standring remarked, that a work of large circulation was being adver¬ 
tised as in conformity with the British Pharmacopoeia, whereas it was in con¬ 
formity with the Pharmacopoeia of 1864. He did not think that a respectable 
publisher should send out an advertisement of that kind, because it was calcu¬ 
lated to mislead purchasers. The advertisement emanated from the Messrs. 
Churchill, who published their Journal ; and he (Mr. S.) had been induced to 
purchase a copy of the work, thinking it was in conformity with the Pharma¬ 
copoeia of 1867, instead of which he found that it accorded with that of 1864. 
This was an important question, particularly as regarded persons in the country, 
who were not so well versed in these changes as those were who resided in 
London. That edition ought not to be advertised as it was, unless it were in 
conformity with the Pharmacopoeia of 1867. He did not say it should not be 
sold, but the real fact should be stated. 
Mr. Mackay, of Edinburgh, said that in Edinburgh such instances as those 
mentioned by Mr. Waugh had sometimes caused a great deal of difficulty. 
Medical practitioners now and again sent out certain prescriptions which were 
not altogether so perfect in their nomenclature as they could wish them to be. 
In Edinburgh the druggists sometimes met for commercial purposes,—not for¬ 
getting, he hoped, the scientific part of their business,—to consider both the 
prices of drugs and also the prices to be charged for dispensing prescriptions ; 
and they had not forgotten the very difficult question of how pharmaceutists 
were to proceed in dispensing prescriptions in cases such as had been alluded to. 
No matter how anxious a pharmaceutist might be that the British Pharma¬ 
copoeia of 1867 should be followed, there were practitioners both in town and 
country, who did not, and who would not for many years to come, conform to 
the names laid down in the index to the present Pharmacopoeia. The conclu¬ 
sion they had come to—and it was a very simple one—was this, that when any 
doubt existed in the mind of the dispenser he should exercise his discretion, but 
indicate what he had done in the margin of the prescription. The best instance 
he could give of the necessity for care in interpreting prescriptions, was by re¬ 
ferring to cases in which Liquor Ammouix Acetatis was ordered. They knew 
what that was according to the late Pharmacopoeia (1864), and what it was 
according to the present Pharmacopoeia (1867). Where the dose would indicate 
that the prescriber intended the stronger or the weaker preparation, they had, as 
a rule, arranged to indicate by certain letters that the dispenser had used that 
of 1864 or of 1867, as the case might be, so that in the event of the prescription 
passing into the hands of another pharmaceutist he might be induced to dis¬ 
pense in the same manner as the previous one. The question was very difficult 
to deal with. He spoke as having come in contact with a good many country 
medical practitioners; and they in many cases declared that they would adhere 
—and adhere in spite of the Medical Council, and in spite of all the new Phar¬ 
macopoeia might indicate—to the old terms and mode of prescribing. The 
pharmaceutists of the present day should be well versed in all that pertains to 
pharmacy, because otherwise they might commit, not it might be hoped a fatal 
mistake, but a mistake which might to a certain extent endanger the health of 
the patient under medical treatment. In Edinburgh they did have now and 
again, as he presumed they might occasionally have in London, on a prescription, 
certain letters within parenthesis, those letters being intended as a guide to the 
other pharmaceutists iuto whose hands it might fall. That might not be alto- 
