June 21, 1873.] 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
1009 
MATERIA MEDICA OF THE UNITED 
STATES’ PHARMACOPEIA. 
BY E. M. HOLMES, 
Curator of the Museum of the Pharmaceutical Society. 
Tlie new Pharmacopoeia of the United States, repre¬ 
senting as it does the medical progress of a country 
so closely allied to our own in many respects, cannot 
fail to attract the attention of all who are interested 
in medicine in this country. It will doubtless be 
eagerly scanned, to see what new medicines have 
been introduced and what improvements adopted by 
the medical authorities ; and the results of the last 
ten years’ experience, as embodied in the present 
issue, will doubtless influence to a certain extent the 
proposed additions to our own Pharmacopoeia. The 
general features of the work have already been fully 
described in a previous number of this Journal, and 
remarks have also been made upon many of the pre¬ 
parations. 
A comparison of the materia medica of the present 
edition with that of the last Pharmacopoeia, as well 
as with that of the British Pharmacopoeia, may per¬ 
haps reveal a few points of interest. 
The materia medica is subdivided into a primary 
and a secondary list. The primary list contains 
chiefly medicines of acknowledged value, with a few 
others, which, although they appear as ingredients in 
some of the more important preparations, cannot be 
regarded as possessed of remedial properties; to this 
class belong cochineal, red sanders, marble, etc. The 
secondary list includes medicines which were at one 
time much employed, but are now gradually falling 
into disuse, without being entirely discarded, as well 
as others which have been lately introduced to the 
notice of the medical profession, and are undergoing 
trial, but which are not generally accepted as pos¬ 
sessed of decided remedial properties. 
This arrangement doubtless presents certain ad¬ 
vantages. Medicine is not entirely free from the 
sway of fashion, and although “ pandering to fashion, 
or to doubtful novelties in pharmaceutical science,” 
is reprobated in the preface to the Pharmacopoeia, 
it cannot be denied that practically it is difficult 
to avoid doing so; thus the great demand for palatable 
medicines in America has probably led to the intro¬ 
duction of the large number of fluid extracts sweetened 
by glycerine, and these would probably have found 
a more fitting place in the secondary list, had doubt¬ 
ful preparations been allowed in it. Some really 
valuable medicines are occasionally allowed to fall 
into disuse, while newer and less useful drugs usurp 
their place. Many medicines which are frequently 
ordered in the prescriptions of older physicians rarely 
occur in those of a later school, but should not on 
that account be expunged from the Pharmacopoeia. 
In such cases the secondary list is of great service in 
preventing really useful remedies from being entirely 
lost sight of. It also provides a place for those me¬ 
dicines which are used to some extent in particular 
localities only, but which are almost unknown in 
others. 
It is very doubtful, however, if the secondary list 
is of much practical use as a half-way house for the 
introduction of new remedies, especially as it only 
appears once in ten years. During that period the 
medical public has made up its mind as to what 
medicines are of real value, and such are accordingly 
placed at once in the primary list. Within the last 
Third Series, No. 156. 
twenty years only seven remedies have been adopted 
into the primary list from the secondary one, viz.: 
brominium, cliondrus, statice, stillingia, gelsemium, 
hydrastis, and ruta. Of these brominium and gel¬ 
semium alone can be said to possess powerful prc« 
perties. Chloral, conii fructus, cerii oxalas, physo- 
stigma, and the other valuable introductions into the 
new Pharmacopoeia, have never appeared in the 
secondary list. This list must therefore be regarded 
rather as a resting place for remedies which are doubt¬ 
fully received from the first, and for those which, like 
saffron, although much used in domestic practice, 
have no decided properties to recommend their use. 
It is rather singular that there should be no similar 
purgatory for doubtful preparations. It may reason¬ 
ably be hoped that the proposed Appendix to the 
British Pharmacopoeia, while it retains the useful 
characters of the secondary list, will admit doubtful 
preparations into its catalogue. 
The primary list of materia medica might perhaps 
be found more easy for reference if united with the 
preparations, the whole being arranged alphabetically 
as in the British Pharmacopoeia. 
Since the last decennial revision, 24 additions have 
been made to the primary, and 3 to the secondary 
list. 
{In the P.B .) 
Acidum carbolicum. 
Acidum oxalicum. 
Cannabis indie a. 
Cerii oxalas. 
Conii fructus. 
Cuprum. 
Physostigma. 
Sodii nitras. 
{Not in t\e P.B.) 
Acidum carbolicum impuram. 
Ammonii nitras. 
Calcii hypophosphis. 
Cannabis americana. 
Chloral. 
Cinchona. 
Ferri hypophosphis. 
Gossypii radicis cortex, 
lodoformum. 
Origanum. 
Potassii hypophosphis. 
Potassii sulphis. 
Sodii bicarbonas venalis. 
Sodii hypophosphis. 
Sodii hyposulphis. 
Zinci oxidum venale. 
Of these conii fructus and origanum were dismissed 
from the U. S. Pharmacopoeia of 1864. The rejection 
of conii fructus was certainly a blunder, the weight 
of evidence being greatly in its favour as compared 
with conii folia. The progress of science during the 
last ten years not having shown any good reasons 
why origanum should be regarded as possessing any 
very remarkable properties, its reintroduction seems 
to have been a mistake in the other direction. The 
reason for the readmission of cinchona—a term de¬ 
noting any variety indifferently, provided it contain 2 
per cent, of alkaloids—is not very evident; the kind 
of bark to be used being specified in each of the pre¬ 
parations containing cinchona. As different \ arieties 
contain different alkaloids, or a variable proportion 
of alkaloids, and as some of the alkaloids are said to 
be more efficacious than others, the license allow ed 
must produce different results in the hands of diffeient 
dispensers. It is difficult to understand why Canna¬ 
bis americana , a plant but little used in America, 
should occupy a place in the primary list, while its 
more powerful congener, C. indica is also official. 
Gossypii radicis cortex is said to possess emmena- 
gomie and parturient properties, but its action appears 
to be very uncertain, so that it is doubtful whether 
it deserves a place in this list. Iodoform was lecom- 
mended some time ago in this counti v ioi glandubu 
