188 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. [September 3, 1870. 
toms above noted. But the authors cannot agree with 
them that the poison, after having produced tetanic con¬ 
vulsions, leads to insensibility, paralysis and death. 
The restraint of the movements was noticed by them 
first, death occurring in the midst of convulsions.— 
Comptes Jtendus. 
REPORT OF THE WARDEN OF THE STANDARDS. 
In his report for the year ending March 31, 1870, Mr. 
Chisholm, the Warden of the Standards, gives in a tabu¬ 
lar form the number of verifications and reverifications 
of Local Standards by the Department each year from 
the 31st March, 1859, to the 31st March, 1870, inclusive. 
During the last twelve months these have amounted to 
1614, being a decrease compared with the previous year 
of no less than 1067. This is partly accounted for by 
the change in the law, which now allows remaining 
county sets of standards to be reverified locally with a 
set which has been duly reverified in the Standards De¬ 
partment. The number of standards rejected last year 
as requiring readjustment was 173, or 11 per cent., the 
proportion in the previous year having been 13 per cent. 
There were at the date of the report 114 places in the 
United Kingdom without legal standard weights, and 85 
without legal standard measures, in consequence of the 
requirement of the law that standard weights should be 
reverified every five, and measures every ten years, not 
having been complied with. These were cases known to 
the department, but it is probable that there were others 
that had escaped official notice. For instance, a set of 
standard weights and measures from the borough of 
Lostwithiel, has been recently delivered at the Standards 
Office for reverification, bearing the date of 1741, and the 
Exchequer stamp of verification of the reign of George 
II., which had been in use in the borough up to that 
time. They appeared to be in good condition consider¬ 
ing their age. The weights were deficient; the lb. 
weight (avoirdupois) wanting 6-5 grains; the measures 
of capacity were mostly in excess, the half-bushel to the 
extent of 1|- gill. The books of the department, which 
commenced in 1824, contain no record of the verification 
of any standards for Lostwithiel. 
During the past year the reverification of all the offi¬ 
cial standards has been completed by the most accurate 
comparisons of the standard measures of capacity, and 
the gas-measuring standards. In no single instance has 
any material error been found that could affect injuri¬ 
ously the accuracy of the copies verified for the use of 
local inspectors. 
A set of standard avoirdupois weights is now being 
■constructed of glass by Mr. Oertling and Messrs. Chance, 
of Birmingham, with a view of ascertaining how far, 
having regard to the cost, durability and invariability 
of such weights, the surface of glass not being liable to 
oxidation, it may be desirable that it should be used as 
the material for local standard weights. 
In pursuance of the recommendations of the Standards 
Commission, new standard measures of one-sixth and 
one-twelfth of a gallon, as measure of the wine bottle 
and half wine bottle, have been constructed and are now 
being verified. A complete set of new standard imperial 
measures of capacity, from the quart downwards, in¬ 
cluding also a series of measures of decimal grain-weights 
of distilled water at the temperature of 62° F., have been 
constructed by Messrs. Griffin. These measures are in 
the form of glass burettes, each of which is fitted with a 
brass collar and screw at the upper part, so that, being 
attached to an apparatus made for the purpose, it may 
be filled with water up to a defining line on the narrow 
tube of the burette and made to deliver the exact mea¬ 
sure. 
A complete set of copies of the official imperial stan¬ 
dards is now being constructed for presentation to the 
French Government. When completed and verified, 
they will be deposited with the collection of standards 
at the Conservatoire Imperial des Arts et Metiers at 
Paris. 
Increased accommodation has been given to the de¬ 
partment by the addition of several fresh rooms to the 
office, which now includes all the three floors of the old 
Norman Jewel Tower. From the great thickness of 
the stone walls of the tower, the rooms in this building 
are favourable for standard operations, being very free 
from vibration, and not liable to sudden fluctuations of 
temperature. The large room in the basement, which 
has a beautifully groined vaulted roof, is fitted up as a 
weighing room, with all the finest balances. The adja¬ 
cent room is fitted for containing all the glass fluid mea¬ 
sures and for making comparisons with them. The 
large room on the first floor is intended to be exclusively 
used for containing the standard measures of length, the 
new microscopical comparing apparatus and the vertical 
comparateur, and for operations with them. The new 
rooms on the upper floor are to contain the large collec¬ 
tion of older standards of an antiquarian or historical cha¬ 
racter. The old roof of these upper rooms, with its large 
beams of chestnut wood, has been completely restored, 
the whole of the interior of the building being made to 
correspond as nearly as possible with its appearance 
when originally completed in the reign of Richard II. 
Invitations have been issued by the French Govern¬ 
ment to the English and other Governments to send de¬ 
legates to take part in the International Standards Com¬ 
mission, with the view that every country in which the 
metric system has been adopted, or its adoption contem¬ 
plated, may be furnished with uniform primary copies 
of the metric standards at Paris of the highest possible 
accuracy. Twenty-one countries have accepted the in¬ 
vitation, the number of delegates amounting to thirty- 
five, to whom will be joined ten more appointed by the 
French Government. The three delegates appointed on 
behalf of England are the Astronomer Royal, Professor 
W. H. Miller, F.R.S., and the Warden of the Standards. 
The Coinage Act of last session has imposed fresh 
duties on the Standards Department ; new standard 
weights of the gold, silver and bronze coins, sixteen in 
number (ranging from the five-pound and the two-pound 
gold piece down to the farthing, and including silver 
twopences and pennies), are now being constructed under 
the provisions of the Act. As soon as these standard 
coin weights shall have been duly verified and made 
legal standards by an Order in Council, regulations will 
be issued under which any copies of the standard coin 
weights may be verified and marked or stamped in the 
department; and no weights other than those so marked 
or stamped are to be deemed just weights for determining 
the weight of gold and silver coins of the realm. 
ANCIENT USE OF ODORIFEROUS PLANTS. 
In his introductory address to the Medical Section of 
the British Medical Association at their late meeting at 
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Dr. Rumsey, referring to a re¬ 
markable series of observations which Professor Mante- 
gazza has reported to the Institute of Lombardy, made 
the following remarks:— 
“ The experiments were not made under the dull sky 
of Britain, but in sunny Italy. We have all heard how 
Acron of Agrigentum, and other followers of Empedocles 
the physicist, employed aromatic and balsamic herbs as 
preventives of pestilence, often burning them, sometimes 
planting them round their cities. So also Herodian re¬ 
cords {langius Jo ., Florilegium , Morbus, p. 1854; Lug- 
duni, 1648) that, in a plague which devastated Italy in 
the second century—the counsel of the doctors having 
been taken—strangers crowding into Rome were directed 
to retreat to Laurentum, now San Lorenzo, that by a 
cooler atmosphere, and by the odour of laurel , they might 
escape the danger of infection. Some of us may have 
