INTERFERENCE OF PHARMACY ACT WITH MEDICAL PRACTITIONERS. 335 
that the words “ its preparations ” follow some of the poisons. Quite true, and 
the preparations of those special articles are poisons to be dealt with as the 
simple substances. Thus if an unauthorized man sell tincture of opium, he is 
liable to a penalty. This is selling , whether there be an open shop or not, and 
is forbidden. There must be two consenting parties in a sale, the buyer and 
seller. 
A medical man and his patient do not stand to each other in the relation of 
buyer and seller ; they are employer and employed. The patient calls in a 
doctor to cure him, and consents to the use of prescribed means. What says 
the 31st section of the Medical Act ? 
“ Every person registered under this Act shall he entitled according to his qua¬ 
lification or qualifications to practise medicine or surgery, or medicine and sur¬ 
gery , as the case may he, and to demand and recover in any court of law , with 
full costs of suit , reasonable charges for professional aid, advice, and visits , and 
the cost of any medicines or other medical or surgical appliances rendered or sup¬ 
plied by him to his patients .” 
Our contemporary dismisses the question, “ What is an open shop ?” as a thing 
too well understood to need consideration. But as the “ open shop ” is the one 
condition set forth in the Pharmacy Act to make dispensing and compounding 
an offence, we must say a word or two about it. It must be remarked that it 
is nowhere said, “ a person shall not dispense,” but that he shall not “ keep open 
shop for dispensing or compounding A 
If a man living in what externally seems to be a private house—no name or 
trade, no red lamp or bottle exposed to attract notice—undertook to dispense 
physicians’ prescriptions, he would, in the eye of the law, be keeping an “ open 
shop,” because ordinary customers would resort to him for the purchase of me¬ 
dicine. A medical practitioner in his close “ surgery ” does nothing of the 
kind ; if you apply there for laudanum, or even to have a prescription dis¬ 
pensed, you will fail in your object, as “ the doctor only physics his own 
patients according to his own opinion of their requirements.” 
It is not for us to go into the question of Surgeons and Apothecaries keeping 
open shops. Our friend the ‘ Lancet,’ always watchful of the privileges of the 
profession, is, at the same time, ever faithfully alive to its honour and dignity, 
and very properly discourages such unholy alliance. We are content with his 
efforts in that direction, and just as confident of his ultimate success as we are 
that in our own province the advance of pharmacy, and a consequent elevation 
and better remuneration of those who practise it, will in due time purge our 
chemists’ shops of many “impurities ” which are at present necessary adjuncts 
to secure even a decent maintenance. 
Our object has been to show that we have heard nothing yet which shakes 
our opinion that legally qualified medical practitioners may, as heretofore, 
dispense medicines for their patients without fear of interruption, and we 
think we may, without violating confidence, assert that the same opinion is 
shared by the authorities in the Privy Council Office, who at least know with 
what object the change in phraseology was effected. 
