544 
ON LIQUOR HYDRARGYRI PEltCHLORIDI, B.P. 
their uniform roundness and pleasant appearance contrasted with that of ordi¬ 
nary pills; thirdly, their compactness and hermetic enclosure, which ensures their 
keeping without change, and at the same time allows of their easy solution in 
the stomach, envelope and excipient being both perfectly soluble. 
Granules containing 1 milligramme of powerful medicines, such as arsenious 
acid, sodic arseniate, digitaline, aconitine, etc., are much prescribed by conti¬ 
nental physicians, especially in Italy ; and where a regular or gradually increas¬ 
ing dose of any such medicine is required, no system so completely fulfils the 
prescriber’s intentions, combined with so little inconvenience to the patient. In 
making these granules, the active ingredient is usually dissolved in the syrup, 
the bulk being merely powdered sugar. Thus in making 10,000 granules of 
sodic arseniate, dissolve in 500 grammes of syrup 10 grammes of the arseniate, 
with which gradually moisten the granules, the operator rubbing and agitating 
them the whole time to prevent their adhesion. 
Leptandrin, assafoetida, and many other nauseous substances, are commonly 
encased in sugar by our American confreres , who certainly display much inge¬ 
nuity in the manner in which they cater for public patronage, some of their 
convenient inventions having become quite indispensable to the upper class of 
that country. At the works established at St. Denis by M. Menier, and now 
belonging to the Pharmacie Centrale of France, the dragees and granules are 
made by steam-machinery, and the rapidity of the operation is increased by a 
blast of warm air driven upon the basin, which revolves eccentrically, rendering 
it almost impossible for the granules to adhere to each other. Sugar-coated 
semen-contra is also much used as a pleasant remedy for worms in children, their 
resemblance to caraway comfits conducing much to their easy administration. 
But here we are trenching on the domains of the confectioner, from whom many 
a lesson is to be learnt in the art of rendering nice and attractive much which 
is in the crude state, to say the least, disgusting and repulsive. 
Paris. 
ON LIQUOR HYDRARGYRI PERCHLORIDI, B.P. 
BY WILLIAM MARTINDALE. 
DISPENSER, AND TEACHER OF PHARMACY TO THE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE HOSPITAL. 
This preparation, which is a modification of the liqueur de Van Swieten, is 
again inserted in the Pharmacopoeia. It was officinal in the London Phar¬ 
macopoeia of 1851, but ejected from the first British Pharmacopoeia. It was 
first introduced into the London Pharmacopoeia of 1809, with the title of 
Liquor Hydrargyri O xy muriatic ^ the formula given was the following:— 
Hydrargyri Oxjmuriatis gr. viij. 
Aquse destillatse fl. ^xv. 
Spiritus rectificati fl. Sj- 
Hydrargyri Oxymuriatem in aqua liqua, eique adjice spiritum. 
The same formula was given in the edition of 1824. In 1836 it was al¬ 
tered, hydrochlorate of ammonia being directed to be used to aid the forma¬ 
tion and preservation of the solution. The London Puarmacopceia of 1851, 
and the present British Pharmacopoeia have retained the same formula, which 
there is reason for believing was originated by Mr. lliillips, as in the preface 
to the second edition of his translation of the London Pharmacopoeia, 1836, 
he takes credit to himself for it, as an improvement upon the older formula. 
He there states:—“ A dilute solution of hydrochlorate of ammonia is now 
