458 
THE PHAEMACEUTICAL JOUENAL AND TEANSACTIONS. 
[December 7, 1872. 
maceutical operations of "boiling, distilling, infusing, 
digesting, etc. 
Mr. Cooper exhibited a specimen of effervescing 
lozenges, which, he said, he had been some years endea¬ 
vouring to produce. He was in hopes that by means of 
these lozenges certain medicines might be administered 
in a more pleasant way than by the present methods. 
Professor Eedwood remarked that Mr. Cooper seemed 
to have made an important step in the direction of ele¬ 
gant pharmacy. 
Mr. Cooper added that if these lozenges had been pro¬ 
duced twenty years ago, homoeopathy would not have 
held its own. 
Mr. Wootton described several specimens of French 
elegant pharmacy, which, he observed, were perhaps not 
very important, though interesting for the excellent 
manner in which they were made. Among these he re¬ 
ferred especially to some sulphovinate of soda (prepared 
as described in the Pharmaceutical Journal of last 
June). There was also on the table a drop measure, 
which he said was the neatest thing he had ever seen, 
and was mathematically correct. The section of the tube 
was three milligrams in diameter. There was also a table 
showing the number of drops to the gram of various 
liquids, varying from water 20 drops, to ether 98 drops 
to the gram. 
Mr. Williams said that within the last two months 
considerable demand had arisen for croton chloral hy¬ 
drate, which, although not a new thing, having been in¬ 
troduced two years ago, had not hitherto been much 
used in medical practice in this country. It was stated 
to he of great value in nervous diseases affecting the face. 
It was made by passing dry chlorine into aldehyde, but 
the first experiments failed; it was found to be a very 
difficult body to manufacture, in consequence of the 
bad quality of the aldehyde. That prepared by the 
process usually given was a very impure body, and, in 
fact, quite unfit for the purpose of making croton chloral. 
He had, therefore, brought a specimen of what he be¬ 
lieved to be nearly pure aldehyde, a thing he had never 
seen before, and of which he thought few in the room 
had any knowledge. It was a powerful body, and pro¬ 
bably might be recommended for medicinal use. In the 
first place, it had great affinity for oxygen. If a stop¬ 
pered bottle were half filled with it and left for a short 
time, the stopper would be held so tight that there would 
be a difficulty in removing it, for the whole of the 
oxygen left in that portion of the bottle was absorbed by 
the aldehyde. They knew ver} r well that the spirits of 
nitre was a very favourite remedy. The Edinburgh Phar¬ 
macopoeia a few years ago ordered spirits of nitre to be 
made with nitrite of ethyl. He believed he was right in 
saying that that preparation did not give satisfaction, and 
was not looked upon as a good medicinal article. An 
opinion had been held that aldehyde played an important 
part in the medicinal action of spirits of nitre. Medical 
men could now determine for themselves whether alde¬ 
hyde had any important medicinal action or not, but if 
they breathed this specimen, he thought they would 
agree with him that it was likely to be a very potent 
one indeed. Speaking theoretically, he thought it 
ought to prove one of the most powerful anaesthetics 
known. The croton chloral hydrate smells of lemon. 
It is formed by two moducules of aldehyde, less one 
moducule of water, the three atoms of hydrogen being 
replaced by three atoms of chlorine ; croton chloral was 
the result, the hydrate forming the beautiful crystalline 
body before them. 
The President mentioned that Mr. Eobbins had pre¬ 
sented the Society with a specimen of amyl hydride, but 
Mr. Eobins was not present to explain it. 
Mr. Carteighe read a paper by Mr. Giles on an 
“ Apparatus for Macerating.” 
[The paper is printed at p. 442, and gave rise to the 
following discussion:—] 
The President remarked that Mr. Giles had in some 
measure misunderstood what he stated at the time re¬ 
ferred to. He stated that in certain tinctures, such as 
tincture ofcalumba, it was desirable to macerate the root 
first of all in a small quantity of water. 
Mr. Umney felt very much indebted to Mr. Giles for 
bringing such an excellent arrangement of displacement 
apparatus before them. Some three or four years ago he 
had a conversation with Mr. Giles, from whom he took 
one or two hints, and since that period he had experi¬ 
mented upon cinchona bark, but with a modification of 
the form of apparatus before them. He had used cucum¬ 
ber glasses, which were cylinders having a diameter of 
2 or 2\ inches, with a length of probably twenty inches 
or two feet. He had ten of these glasses, and had taken 
100 ounces of cinchona bark, dividing the bark into ten 
portions, and percolating with successive pints of water, 
the percolate of the first being put upon the second, the 
second on to the third, and so on to the tenth. It was 
found that when 100 fluid ounces of percolate had been 
obtained, the bark was almost wholly exhausted. These 
evaporated, and one-third of its volume of spirit added, 
produced 20 per cent, of fluid extract, which was a good 
average quantity of completed liquor. 
Mr. Gerrard suggested that it would be an improve¬ 
ment if each cone were divided by four, and only to have 
one receiver. There was by the present plan a consider¬ 
able loss by spontaneous evaporation. 
Mr. Umney said the last speaker seemed to forget 
that it was necessary to put the percolates on to each 
other successively, and therefore it was impossible to 
have one for four, or they would do away with the chief 
part of the process. 
Mr. Bland corroborated Mr. Umney’s statement as 
to the advantage of the cucumber glasses, and said he 
had been in the habit of using them for the last eighteen 
or twenty years. 
The President believed with Mr. Bland that there 
were no percolators much better than cucumber glasses, 
only sometimes they were not perfect, not being of the 
same diameter throughout. They, therefore, got an 
uneven pressure; but he had had one made upon the 
principle of a cucumber tube, and it was as perfect as 
a good glass syringe should be, being even all through. 
A paper was read by Mr. J. B. Barnes “ On the Ex¬ 
tracts containing Chlorophyll.” 
[The paper is printed at p. 441, and gave rise to the 
following discussion :—] 
The President said that this subject was one which 
ought to elicit considerable discussion. For his own 
part, he never could see the advantage of retaining the 
chlorophyll, because although a nice bright green when 
first made, the colour very soon became brown,—certainly 
before they could have a fresh supply in the following 
year. It was a question whether the extract deprived 
of the chlorophyll would be as manageable when put into 
a pill as when the chlorophyll was present. With regard 
to a making liquid extract from the extract reduced to 
dryness, he thought it was open to a good deal of question 
whether the extract would not suffer considerably during 
the process of drying, in order to be in a good condition 
afterwards,—whether it would not be possible without so 
much reduction to reduce the extract to a certain specific 
gravity, and then add the spirit that might be desirable 
to keep it. They had two or three instances of liquid 
extracts in the Pharmacopoeia in the Succus Conii and 
the Succus Scoparii, which he thought were fair illustra¬ 
tions of what might be done in that way. Of course they 
were comparatively weak as compared with what might 
be made under Mr. Barnes’s idea. The subject was 
well worthy their consideration, and Mr. Barnes had 
done a service to pharmacy in bringing it before tho 
Society. 
Mr. Hanbury thought the author had rather over¬ 
looked the fact that the raw materials employed in these; 
