EDINBURGH MEETING. 
23 
The report and the office-bearers for next year were unanimously approved of by the 
meeting. Thereafter Mr. D. R. Brown proposed a vote of thanks to Mr. Ainslie, the 
retiring President, for his services during the past year, which was carried very cordially 
by all present. 
Dinner and Testimonial to Mr. John Mackay. 
At the close of the annual meeting, those present joined several gentlemen who had 
assembled to entertain Mr. John Mackay to dinner, on the occasion of presenting him 
with several pieces of silver plate, in recognition of the valuable services rendered by 
him to the Pharmaceutical Society for the last twenty-eight years, during which he has 
held the office of honorary secretary for the North British Branch of the Society. About 
fifty sat down to dinner, including Professor Archer, Dr. Stevenson Macadam, Dr. 
Robertson, Glasgow; Mr. Mathews, London ; Mr. Stanford, Glasgow; Mr. Robertson, 
Mr. Gardner, Mr. D. R. Brown, Mr. Young, Mr. Beith, Mr. Tait, etc. Mr. H. C. Baildon 
occupied the chair, and Mr. Ainslie acted as croupier. During the evening Mr. Mackay 
was presented, as a token of esteem and respect from those connected with the profession 
of pharmacy in Edinburgh, Glasgow, London, etc., with a very valuable and handsome 
testimonial. The testimonial was placed upon the table, and consisted of a splendid 
silver dinner service, and other articles. One of these was a massive solid silver salver, 
more than twenty-two inches in diameter, with the arms of the Pharmaceutical Society 
engraved in the centre, and representations of the principal plants in the Pharmacopoeia. 
The silver epergne was three feet high, with four branches, and stood on a silver plateau, 
the rim of which is embossed with vine-leaves and grapes. The two side-pieces and 
claret-jug are also of silver. The other articles were three electro-plate golden vases, 
one of them furnished with a clock. The cost of the whole was upwards of £150. 
The usual loyal and patriotic toasts having been given from the chair, and duly 
honoured,— 
The Chairman then rose and said:—In proposing the health of our friend and guest, 
Mr. John Mackay, my only regret is that it has not fallen into the hands of one more 
able than myself to do it justice. Little, however, requires to be said beyond a mere 
enumeration of the important services gratuitously rendered during the long period of 
twenty-eight years to the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, and more especially 
to the North British Branch, to show the claim our friend has upon our gratitude and 
esteem. Whilst I doubt not that the pieces of plate now before us will convince Mr. 
Mackay that his arduous services have not failed to be appreciated by us, I may mention 
that up to the year 1852 no record was kept of the work done during the eleven pre¬ 
vious years, although many meetings were held. In 1852 we obtained our first Phar¬ 
macy Act, the correspondence connected with which must have involved a large sacri¬ 
fice of time and labour. Subsequently to this Act, and up to the preseut time, no less 
than forty-nine meetings for examination were held, at which 376 candidates were exa¬ 
mined, all of which meetings were arranged and attended by our honorary secretary. 
Since 1852, sixty-eight scientific meetings have been organized, the greater number of 
which would certainly not have been given at all but through the strenuous exertions 
and personal influence of our friend. In addition to these, fifty-seven meetings of coun 
cil and seventeen annual meetings were held, at all of which Mr. Mackay acted as our 
honorary secretary. These, taken in the aggregate, represent an amount of time and 
labour voluntarily given which I hesitate not to say no other member in Scotland was 
prepared to give. But our friend did all this unobtrusively and unostentatiously, with 
an object kept steadily in view, viz. the advancement of the science of pharmacy in this 
country, through the instrumentality of the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain, 
and in this he has been successful. The original impulse which has led him to go 
through this amount of labour springs, I doubt not, from his personal friendship with 
the founder of our Society, the late Jacob Bell, whose memory must always be held by 
us all in grateful remembrance. In 1861, Mr. Mackay was elected a member of the 
London Council, and has attended no fewer than thirty-four times at the meetings of 
the Board in Bloomsbury Square. And now another important Service comes to be 
named. When he first became a member of the London Council, the Journal of the 
Society was published at a loss of no less than £608 a year. Mr. Mackay felt convinced 
that this heavy loss might be avoided, but his views on the subject were considered im¬ 
practicable and chimerical. However, on his return to Edinburgh, he obtained estimates 
