€04 
THE TWENTY-THIRD ANNIVERSARY OF 
in use on the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway, a signal may be turned by 
means of electricity, and at any distance from the operator. In addition to 
these, there was a specimen of submarine cable, with polypi formations, from 
Mr. Fleeming Jenkin ; magnetic dial instruments and specimens of submarine 
telegraph cables, from Messrs. Siemens, Ilalske, and Co. ; a printing telegraph, 
Morse’s apparatus, Ragon’s bell, pneumatic relay, various telegraph insulators, 
mounted, Silver’s improved voltaic battery, and a collection of articles in ebonite, 
from Messrs. Silver and Co.; a set of metrical weights and measures, from 
James Yates, Esq. ; air-pumps and chemical apparatus from Mr. Griffin; mo ¬ 
dels of crystals, from Mr. Larkin ; a curious doctor’s bill of the eighteenth cen¬ 
tury, from Mr. Willows; photographs, from the Royal Exchange Portrait 
Company ; improved oxygen inhaler and apparatus, from Mr. Robbins ; an ap¬ 
paratus for condensed oxygen, from Mr. Barth ; poison bottles, from Mr. Too- 
good, and Godfrey’s poison bottles, from Mr. Underhill; air filters and ventilat¬ 
ing apparatus, from Mr. Boyle ; and a large show of microscopes, etc., from 
Messrs. Ross, Smith and Beck, Murray ancl Heath, Carpenter and Westley, 
Plow, IPighley, and Shuter. 
During the evening Professor Abel delivered a very interesting and impor¬ 
tant lecture to a crowded audience in the lecture theatre; the lecturer demon¬ 
strated by some interesting experiments the applicability of gun cotton to the 
purposes for which gunpowder is now used, and from which it appeared that 
the great objections which used to be urged against the use of gun cotton as an 
explosive material have been overcome, partly by the improved process of manu¬ 
facture and partly by using it in a plaited or woven state. A photograph was 
taken by the magnesium light by Mr. Claudet. The apparatus used in the 
testing of gas was shown and illustrated by experiment by Mr. C. H. Wood. 
Experiments on diffraction of light were shown by Messrs. Horne, Thornthwaite, 
and Co. ; and experiments on hydrogen flame were shown by Mr. Broughton. 
There was also a collection of percolators from Mr. Haselden, Mr. Gilbertson, 
the York Glass Company; Sanger’s percolator, from Mr. Toogood; and Dr. 
Redwood’s automatic displacement apparatus, from Mr. Coffey. A mechanical 
stirrer in action was also shown by Mr. T. B. Redwood. 
THE TWENTY-THIRD ANNIVERSARY MEETING 
OF THE PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY. 
Wednesday, May 18 th, 1864. 
MR. G. W. SANDFORD, PRESIDENT, IN THE CHAIR. 
The President opened the Meeting with the following Address:— 
Gentlemen,-—Twenty-three years ago the chemists and druggists of this king¬ 
dom formed themselves into a* Society for the advancement of pharmacy by the 
education and protection of those who should practise it. Annually since that 
period they have met together under this roof to review their progress, and renew 
their pledge of union. To-day I think we may regard our position with no little 
satisfaction ; we may think of the want of union which had previously existed, 
of the various individual interests which served rather to keep men apart, as 
difficulties surmounted, and regard the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain 
at this moment as a compact and powerful body corporate, united in itself, 
acknowledged and respected by others as a national institution. But although 
these difficulties have been surmounted, you must forgive me for recalling them 
to your recollection ; it seems to me wise that we should always regard them as 
opposing forces to our progress, kept in abeyance only by our own heartiness in 
the cause we have undertaken. Our success is due, gentlemen, mainly to perse¬ 
verance in the course laid down by those honoured men who laboured so earnestly 
