255 
MENDACIOUS PUFFING. 
The art of puffing has been carried to a magnificent height. Not content 
with placarding his announcements on walls and hoardings, the aspiring adver¬ 
tiser now displays himself on the roofs of omnibuses, both within and without. 
Some months ago, we were startled to see upon one of these vehicles the word 
OPOPONAX, in letters a foot high. What could it mean? opoponax, an 
obsolete drug of most repulsive odour,—who in his sober senses could prevail on 
the public to purchase that ? 
But the mystery has been resolved by the advertisement of an enterprising 
perfumer, claiming a doctor’s degree, who after seventeen stanzas, worthy of an 
Aldgate tailor, ventures the following assertions:—That Opoponax Chironium , a 
plant of Sicily, produces flowers of exquisite fragrance, some of which in a dry 
state were brought from Mexico (!) u after the return of the British and Spanish 
Expedition ,” by u a well-known amateur botanist , distinguished for his services at 
seaf and that this circumstance has led to their importation as an article of 
commerce, and use as the basis “ from which is distilled the now famous opo¬ 
ponax!' 1 ' 1 . _ 
As all this is given as serious scientific information, and rendered plausible 
by a reference to Professor Balfour, and a quotation from Bescherelle’s Irench 
Dictionary, besides half-a-dozen words of Greek, it might really be supposed 
a piece of curious and trustworthy intelligence, instead of most mendacious 
puffery. It might certainly strike a thoughtful reader as somewhat puzzling, 
how the ‘‘ British and Spanish Expedition ” should bring from Mexico , the dried 
flowers of a plant of Greece and Italy ; how this plant, which is remarkable for 
its foetid juice, should afford a perfume of extraordinary fragrance ; and how, if 
the opoponax plant exists in Mexico in sufficient abundance to be collected, it 
has never been obtained by any one of the numerous botanists who have tra¬ 
versed that country in all directions, but that its discovery was reserved for the 
u well-known amateur ” of naval celebrity. But these are little matters into 
which it is not to be supposed that the public will inquire too nicely, though it 
is well to throw out a wholesome caution about dangerous imitations, and the 
necessity of remembering where the only genuine article can be purchased. 
TRANSACTIONS 
OF 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL SOCIETY. 
AT A MEETING OF THE COUNCIL, ith October , 1865, 
Present—Messrs. Bottle, George Edwards, Evans, Hanbury, Mackay, Morson, Orridge, 
Randall, and Squire, 
The following were elected— 
MEMBERS. 
Alexander Barnett.Buxton. 
William Gunn.Dunse. 
EXAMINATION, October 1 Ith, 1865. 
(Registered as Pharmaceutical Chemists.) 
Angior, John ...Liverpool. 
Averill, Josiah.Stafford. 
Best, James.London. 
Bienvenu, John .Southampton. 
