cos 
BRISTOL PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION. 
similar result to that obtained by the Pharmacopoeia method if it be kept ex¬ 
posed to the light for about a week. 
PROVINCIAL TRANSACTIONS. 
BRISTOL PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION. 
At the meeting of this Association held on Friday, March 11, 1870, Mr. W. W. 
Stoddart, President, in the chair, the following lecture on “ Apothecaries, Druggists, 
and Pharmacists, Past, Present, and Future,” was delivered by Mr. Charles Towns¬ 
end :— 
Mr. President, Ladies, and Gentlemen,—I wish to occupy your attention, and fear 
I may tire your patience this evening, with a slight sketch of the history of pharmacy, 
and of those engaged in its pursuit. 
And as most of you are directly or indirectly concerned in the present position and 
future prospects of this branch of science, either as working bees somewhat wearily 
oollecting the honey day by day, or as queen bees, receiving in stately contentment 
the gathered store,—I venture to hope your personal interest in the question will help 
me in some degree to make it attractive. 
Whilst preparing my paper, I have been unwillingly but forcibly reminded of a 
young gentleman who, many years ago, was an enthusiastic member of a popular de¬ 
bating society, and who, being asked to write an essay on some subject agreeable to 
his tastes and talents, but which must not occupy more than twenty minutes in de¬ 
livery, selected for his subject the “ History of the Worldand, as you may well 
imagine, before his hour came, heartily repented of his rashness. 
I am afraid an attempt to give even an outline of the history of apothecaries, drug¬ 
gists, and pharmacists in the past, and of their present position and future prospects 
within the limits of a short lecture, is almost an equally dangerous experiment. And 
I must ask for the indulgence of gentlemen present, my seniors in years and in know¬ 
ledge, to whom much of what I have to say to-night may prove a thrice-told tale, 
and beg that for the sake of any who have never studied the literature of pharmacy, 
they will pardon me if my paper lacks the freshness which I trust it may bring to 
some of our members. 
So far as I am aware, a complete history of pharmacy and pharmacists remains to 
be written, and if by anything I can say to-night, I can stimulate some of our younger 
brethren present, to whom we must look , to maintain and uplift the honour and dig¬ 
nity of our profession in the future, to sift and exhaust this fruitful and engaging 
subject, and to present in a compact form such a history, I shall feel that I am more 
than repaid for my slight efforts in this direction. 
Some of our friends have made the study of the pre-adamite world their delight, 
and have by their researches added much to our strange and wonderful knowledge of 
those distant epochs when gigantic palms and ferns waved in luxuriant magnificence 
round the site of our ancient city, and mammoth ichthyosauri disported themselves in 
undisputed possession of our present homes. 
In those happy days medicine was unknown, and every creature was permitted to 
live unmolested, and to die a natural and peaceful death. 
With man’s advent came a sad necessity; and very soon “the ills that flesh is 
heir to” perplexed the early world, and clamoured for relief; and so the history of 
pharmacy makes its starting-point in the grey dawn of human life. 
We have no record of the adventurous individual who administered, and the still 
more adventurous and confiding patient who swallowed, the first dose of medicine. 
Subsisting almost exclusively on fruits and vegetables, no doubt our forefathers in 
their search for food, became, by degrees, acquainted with plants or herbs possessing 
healing virtue, and by slow degrees and a constantly repeated need, some rough rude 
principles came to be understood, which formed the basis of the science of medicine. 
