CHLORODYNE versus LIQ. CHLOROFORMI CO. 
147 
which he retained ever after. The following is the process:—“ Take one pound 
of hartshorn-shavings ; boil them in a large quantity of water, and dry them 
by a slow fire. Rub them to a fine powder. Then put an equal weight of the 
hartshorn and powdered crude antimony into a crucible, and set° it on a 
moderate fire, stirring it with a long rod of iron for six hours or as long as it 
smokes.” 
I have repeated the above process several times, but never could produce the 
snow-white powder with which we are familiar ; the resulting colour being 
generally that of Bath brickdust already described, but on a few occasions 
paler. Yet the statement of Mr. Speer is I think supported by facts. Dr. 
Pearson says, “ It is probable that this powder was made for several years with 
merely the heat necessary to carry off the sulphur and calcine the bone, in an 
open vessel, and consequently it was of a light clay or ash colour. Its property 
of turning white in a greater degree of fire appears to have been a subsequent 
discovery.” But in this greater degree of fire the powder discharges copious 
fumes of protoxide of antimony, and becomes less active as a medicine ; and at 
length assuming the hard, vitreous state, it loses all medical power. On one 
occasion, when I had obtained the powder from the iron ladle paler than usual, 
I took several doses of it without any striking effect, which proves at least that, 
in this state, it is innoxious; its taste was most disagreeable, whereas the white 
powder is tasteless. I imagine that in this form the powder would prove to be 
in its most active state ; that it was in this form that Lile’s and Schawanberg’s 
powder obtained its celebrity; and that the subsequent process of whitening it 
by fire deteriorates its medical effects more or less according to its degree and 
continuance. But it is of little use to insist on this part of the subject in the 
present day. If the whitening process in the skittle-pot were relinquished, and 
the light ash-coloured powder from the ladle were accepted, we should probably 
have an efficacious medicine of uniform or little-varying strength. 
Clare Street , Dublin. 
CHLORODYNE versus LIQ. CHLOROEORMI CO. 
BY A PROVINCIAL. 
In the present stage of the above controversy, it may be both pertinent and 
opportune to record in the columns of the Journal, an illustrative case which 
has a direct bearing upon the question. 
But before stating this case, I desire to guard myself against the supposition, 
that anything I may hereafter say should be construed as approving, or sanc¬ 
tioning a practice, which has become very prevalent of late, viz. that of ‘ borrow¬ 
ing ’ (stealing might seem to some persons a more appropriate designation) the 
title of a medicine, or of a preparation, which, either by the good fortune, or 
the exertion, or the expenditure of the proprietor has, at length, attained a cer¬ 
tain reputation with the public. When any specific appellative has become the 
distinct and distinctive representative of a valuable property, and in the eyes of 
an irreflective public is that property, then, to seize upon that title, to trade 
upon it, and convert to one’s own use the fruits of another man’s labour and 
luck, seems, to an understanding which has not been educated in the ethics of 
‘ the period,’ nothing short of piracy. 
While speaking of the morality of this course of proceeding, I am reminded 
that, some three or four years ago, a reprint appeared in the Journal of a paper on 
the subject of “ Pharmaceutical Ethics ; ” in which paper, if my memory serves 
me, this particular class of cases (as well as some others of equal and kindred 
interest) was no«t discussed ; although it might have been expected that the 
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