442 
PHARMACEUTICAL MEETING. 
same material of which, they had made the small one, and I have every reason 
to think well of it. It is furnished with a tap at the bottom, by which I am 
able to macerate as long as required before I allow the fluid to pass through; 
it is cylindrical, and furnished with a movable perforated diaphragm, about 
two inches from the bottom, resting upon four supports ; the ingredients are 
placed upon this diaphragm, and three-fourths of the spirit poured on as di¬ 
rected ; a portion passes through and fills up the space between the bottom of 
the percolator and the diaphragm, so that the material while macerating is 
surrounded by the liquid : it can be well stirred during this primary part of 
the process. At the expiration of forty-eight hours the tap is turned, and the 
tincture or liquor allowed to pass through into a glass receiver, of almost any 
size, fitting the tap by means of a shive ; that completed, the second perforated 
diaphragm is placed upon the top of the material, and the remainder of the 
liquid added. This having ceased to percolate through, the marc, as directed, is 
taken out, pressed, and the liquor mixed with the other portion, and the quan¬ 
tity of spirit added to make up the full measure of one or two gallons, as the 
case may be. Here is some compound tincture of cardamoms so prepared ac¬ 
cording to the form of the B. P., and I think no one will complain either of 
the colour or taste. The quantity of proof spirit lost in making two gallons 
was eight ounces. My only motive in showing this percolator is the pleasure 
I feel in giving you the small benefit of my experience. I claim no origina¬ 
lity of idea beyond the material of which it is made ; and I am sure that 
Mr. Maw will be happy to make them of any required capacity, should you 
approve of the idea. 
A. E. Haselden. 
18, Conduit Street , March 1, 1864. 
Mr. Parmer thought the cost of Mr. Haselden’s percolator would restrict 
its use. They could not afford to pay four or five guineas for such an appara¬ 
tus, out of the profits derived from the sale of tinctures. He was accustomed to 
use a more simple form of apparatus, which he found to answer very well, but 
he did not approve of the process as directed in the British Pharmacopoeia; 
percolation properly conducted was more convenient and more efficient than 
that process. 
Mr. Haselden advocated the use of his percolator on the ground of its ap¬ 
plicability to the Pharmacopoeia process, an object which the pharmaceutist 
would now have to keep in view. It was merely the large size of the apparatus 
before them that rendered it costly. It could of course be made of any size 
suitable for their several requirements. 
Mr. Mace at, of Edinburgh, had found the glass percolator of the York 
Glass Company a very convenient apparatus for operations on the small scale, 
and he believed this was also the experience of those pharmaceutists with 
whom he was accustomed to associate in the north. Eor operations on the 
large scale a metallic percolator was required, and the one before them ap¬ 
peared to be very suitable for that purpose. His own experience in the pre¬ 
paration of tinctures, and he believed it was also the experience of many 
others, was that many tinctures were made more conveniently and quite 
as well by the old process of maceration as by that of percolation. 
Mr. Squire thought the advantage of percolation over maceration had 
not been clearly established, while the difficulty of applying percolation in 
many cases was generally admitted. 
Mr. Roberts did not think the term percolation could be strictly applied 
to the process described in the British Pharmacopoeia. In conducting the 
process of percolation with effect, it was found necessary to have the solid in¬ 
gredients reduced to a uniform, and as far as admissible to a minute state of 
