604 
PHARMACEUTICAL MEETING. 
little evaporation to bring the oxymel to a proper consistence. If it be true 
that part of the medicinal property of squill is volatile, will not this prepara¬ 
tion be much impaired by the long-continued application of heat? What ad¬ 
vantage is there in evaporating the honey and acetum mixed together? In the 
London Pharmacopoeia, 1851, the acetum was ordered to be concentrated by 
evaporation, and the honey added afterwards. This is more reasonable, al¬ 
though, on account of the difference in consistency of honey, the oxymel pro¬ 
duced would vary a little in this respect. 
If made with a strong acetum, prepared from the fresh bulbs, as I have sug¬ 
gested, concentration would be unnecessary. . 
Tinctura Aurantii .—'This is directed to be made by macerating dried bitter 
orange-peel in proof spirit. As it is a flavouring agent, and seeing that fresh 
peel is so much superior to the dried in this respect, it has been suggested that 
the tincture should be prepared from it. No housewife thinks of preparing 
marmalade from dried orange-peel, nor should pharmacists be directed to 
prepare a tincture from it, seeing that at a certain season of the year Seville 
oranges can be had at nearly every village shop in the kingdom. 1 he fresh 
peel yields a tincture which, when diluted with water, still remains clear, not 
like the present tincture, as it, on account of some of the aromatic principles 
having become resinous, and therefore insoluble in aqueous fluids, on the addi¬ 
tion of water forms a milky mixture. If made with the fresh peel rectified 
spirit should be used ; the juice contained in the peel will bring the tincture 
down to about the same strength of spirit as that of the present tincture. 
Unquentum Hydrargyri Ammoniciti .—This preparation containing one part of 
white precipitate in eight of the ointment, is unnecessarily strong, it is, in fact, 
dangerously so, when it has to be freely used for any length of time, such ap¬ 
plication being necessary in some skin diseases. If made with one-twelfth the 
quantity of white precipitate even, the precaution being taken to levigate it 
carefully with a little oil previous to the addition of the lard, it is, according to 
Dr. Tilbury Fox, of sufficient strength for nearly all cases where its application 
is ciGSirclfolG# 
Plasters .—This group of preparations are rarely “ home made,” and as a rule 
their appearance, rather than their utility, is the point most considered in the 
wholesale trade. There seems to be a great redundancy of them in the Phar¬ 
macopoeia, The same ingredients, with the proportions varied, are contained 
in emplastrum resinse and emplastrum saponis. My experience of these plas¬ 
ters leads me to believe that in any case where they are used, their applica¬ 
tion might be replaced with advantage by the simple lead plaster, provided it 
be properly made. Lead plaster has not then the much admired opaque white¬ 
ness, which is preferred in the trade. The Pharmacopoeia directions for its pre¬ 
paration are not sufficiently definite ; nothing is said about the glycerine that 
is formed in the process, whether it is to be separated, or evaporated away the 
plaster to be allowed to absorb as much of it as possible, or to be washed out by 
the “pulling” operation under water, which it generally undergoes to give it 
the saleable appearance. . , , 
My experiments with this and other preparations are not yet completed ; on 
some future occasion I hope to be able to publish the results. # . 
Among the other plasters, two are likewise very redundant in composition,-— 
emplastrum picis and emplastrum calefaciens. In the latter formula, quantities 
of simples will have to be meted out no less than nineteen times. The effect of 
this redundancy is that nostrums, much simpler in composition, meet with a 
much larger sale,—Poor Man’s Plaster, for example. One likes to know “ the 
reason why” there should be such exuberance in their composition. I, in my 
teaching, am continually asked this question, and rightly so ; if the formulae are 
what they ought to be, they must be consistent with reason. 
