THE RELATION OF REMUNERATION TO RESPONSIBILITY. 
16 S 
It would be sanguine to expect an immediate remedy for a case of long 
■standing, nor are sudden changes to be desired or to be trusted. We must 
patiently wait for the beneficial operation of the Pharmacy Amendment Act, 
first by a slow process weeding out that irregular competition already re¬ 
ferred to, in the place of which we may hope to see a laudable emulation 
in excellence rather than in price, giving us a higher standard, as well as 
greater uniformity, throughout the trade. Many will remember the sweep¬ 
ing accusation recently made in one of the medical journals by a me¬ 
dical practitioner, that if the same preparation were taken into half-a-dozen 
different chemists’ shops, the medicine would scarcely correspond from any 
two of them. Unfortunately, our own experience tells that there is too much 
truth at the bottom of this damaging imputation, and while it is so we 
cannot hope that pharmacy will take its rightful place in public estimation,— 
which cannot be secured by the merits of a few, but must be deserved by the 
conduct of the many. Simultaneously, it is to be hoped that the practice of 
preparing our own compounds will become general, and that the time will 
soon arrive when a laboratory will be considered an indispensable part of 
every pharmacy. Perhaps I am over-riding a hobby, but I hope to be ex¬ 
cused for saying that there is only one way by which a pharmaceutist can 
acquire the proper interest in, and have the proper guarantee of the quality 
of his preparations,—of course I exclude chemicals,—and that way is by 
manufacturing them on the premises. There is, on the other hand, no cause 
•so productive of underselling, or so prejudicial to our professional aspira¬ 
tions, as the practice which has grown up comparatively of late years of buy¬ 
ing everything ready-made, whereby we become the mere chapmen of drugs. 
Although we may not, on the score of a vested interest in the profits of the 
supply, interfere with the form in which prescribers may think fit to order 
the medicines which it is our province to dispense, we may upon totally dif¬ 
ferent grounds (viz. in the interests of the public safety) set ourselves reso¬ 
lutely against that dangerous system of prescribing deadly ingredients in 
concentrated forms, such as recently caused the distressing death of Miss 
Campbell. Such medicines as that placed in the hands of this unfortunate 
young lady, are not fit for the manipulation of any but a competent and care¬ 
ful pharmaceutist. What an outcry would be raised if one of us permitted 
a partially-trained apprentice to manipulate such a solution, in the event of a 
similar casualty arising from his blunder! It is not only a duty to the public, 
but it is due to our own security, that we should resist this which, I am told, 
is a growing practice in London, and which we may expect will extend (as 
London usages commonly do) to the provinces. It is not just that we should 
be exposed to the risk of compounding these preparations in the hurry of 
business, when any miscarriage would be fraught with danger, for which we 
should be legally (although the prescriber might be morally) responsible. 
I have clearly made up my mind that when it is necessary to dispense these 
objectionable medicines, our duty to the public requires that we should make 
them the subject of special precautions, and our duty to ourselves requires 
that they should be made subject to special prices. We might also represent 
to the profession (with whom our relations are now so much improved as to 
be generally of a frankly confidential character) the inadvisability of pre¬ 
scribing poisonous quantities of any ingredient in any single bottle con¬ 
taining medicine for internal administration ; especially in any bottle the 
capacity of which would permit of its contents being accidentally taken at a 
draught; and I think that any bottle containing a poisonous ingredient in 
sufficient quantity to endanger life—whether intended for external use or for 
internal administration—ought to bear conspicuously a “ Poison ” label. This 
perhaps might be regarded as a little gentle pressure upon those prescribers 
