567 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
-January 14, 1871.] 
obtainable. The difficulty in the way is the preservation 
of a sufficient supply from season to season without its 
becoming rancid. Many suggestions have been made 
by different writers, having in view the preservation of 
lard, by such means as the addition of gum resins, bal¬ 
sams, or solutions of the same, etc., but all are liable to 
some objection. The best and simplest method of ac¬ 
complishing the desired end that has come under our 
notice is that followed in the Apothecaries’ Hall, at 
•Glasgow, Scotland, where the freshly-prepared lard is 
tilled into bladders, which are afterwards tied at their 
necks and suspended in a cool cellar. 
Savin Cerate. —This excellent irritant cerate is but 
little used at present; indeed, so seldom is it prescribed, 
that the dispenser is apt to find to his dismay his stock 
on hand, injured by exposure and age. It is preferable, 
therefore, to prepare this cerate extemporaneously, when 
required, and this can be readily done by keeping for 
the purpose the oleo-resin of savin, prepared by ex¬ 
hausting the leaves with ether, and evaporating accord¬ 
ing to the U. S. P. formula for the cerate. By weighing 
the oleo-resin, and ascertaining the proportionate amount 
appropriate to each ounce of cerate, the two may be 
mixed whenever required. 
Ointment of Iodide of Sulphur. —The direction of the 
Pharmacopoeia “ to reduce the iodide of sulphur to a 
tine powder, with a little of the lard,” has not proved 
practicable in our hands, as by the process we have failed 
to reduce the iodide to the fine state of division essential 
to a good ointment. Several modifications have been 
proposed, as triturating with small quantities of alcohol, 
ether, chloroform, and bisulphide of carbon; but these 
substances have little solvent action on the iodide; the 
use of the iodide of potassium has also been suggested, 
but this decomposes the iodide and hence is objection¬ 
able. Oil of turpentine has been used, but we have 
found the best success attending the use of the oil of 
lavender as a solvent—a few drops being sufficient, and 
there can be no reasonable objection to this addition. 
To secure dispatch in the mixing of extracts with 
'ointments and cerates, we keep such extracts as bella¬ 
donna, stramonium, opium and arnica, in a fluid condi¬ 
tion, by means of equal parts of water and glycerin. 
The diluted glycerin is added to its own weight of ex¬ 
tract, and when the latter is prescribed in combination 
with a cerate, it, of course, is only necessary to substi- 
iute for the extract double its weight of the liquefied 
•article. 
It is of frequent occurrence that prescribers direct 
large quantities of watery or alcoholic solutions to be 
mixed with ointments or cerates. The best means of in¬ 
corporating the greatest possible quantity is to melt the 
fatty matter and stir in the solution. 
Tannic acid is seldom found in the matter of such 
purity as to form a clear solution. To facilitate the dis¬ 
pensing of solutions of this acid, we are accustomed to 
keep on hand a clear standard solution, preserved by 
glycerin. It is prepared by dissolving the tannin in a 
•small quantity of water, filtering the solution, adding a 
’weight of glycerin equal to that of tannic acid employed, 
and evaporating the fluid to such an extent that each 
part of tannin is represented by two parts by weight of 
the solution. 
Suppositories. —When moulds of block tin are used, 
the main point necessary to secure success is to have the 
moulds thoroughly chilled by ice before the addition of 
the melted material; when this is observed, there is no 
difficulty in removing the suppositories with ease and 
within a few minutes. 
Rose W'iter. —When this is propared from the oil by 
rubbing with magnesia and adding water, a certain loss 
of oil occurs (absorbed by the magnesia) and the result¬ 
ing water will not give clear solutions with nitrate of 
silver, owing to the solution of a minute quantity of the 
carbonate of magnesia, or of saline matters contaminating 
Ihe latter, or both. A better method, and which, of 
course, yields a pure product, is to drop the oil into boil¬ 
ing distilled water and incorporate by agitation. Other 
medicated waters may be prepared in a similar manner. 
—The Chicago Pharmacist. 
BROMIDE OF POTASSIUM. * 
In 1826 M. Barthez and MM. Andral and Fournet 
published the results of researches made by them into 
the physiological and therapeutical action of bromine and 
of the bromide of potassium.f They reported that bro¬ 
mine possessed the power of rapidly removing pain in 
joints affected by chronic arthritis, and of lessening the 
swelling, immobility and deformity. M. Pourche, of 
Montpellier, also had found the bromide of service in the 
treatment of bronchocele, and in scrofulous affections. £ 
MM. Puche, Huette and Rames attributed to this salt 
an anaesthetic action ; and M. Thielmann, a Russian phy¬ 
sician, asserted that it exercises a marked sedative action 
upon the organs of generation. In 1836 it was intro¬ 
duced into the London Pharmacopoeia in consequence of 
the great success that had followed its use by Dr. Wil¬ 
liams, of St. Thomas’s Hospital, in cases of enlarged 
spleen. It did not prove equally useful in the hands of 
other practitioners. The observations of M. Thielmann 
and others bore but little fruit till they fell under the 
notice of Sir Charles Locock and led him to try the bro¬ 
mide of potassium in cases of “ hysterical epilepsy.” In 
1857 Sir Charles stated to the Medical and Chirurgical 
Society that he had given the drug, in ten-grain doses, 
in fourteen or fifteen cases of epilepsy, and that the drug 
had proved eminently useful. § Since then the bromide has 
become a very “fashionable” medicine, and in consequence 
has been misused and overrated, and credited with reco¬ 
veries with which it had in reality no other relation than 
one of time. As a consequence of this, the pendulum of 
opinion has in some minds swung to the opposite ex¬ 
treme ; and there are to be found those who doubt whe¬ 
ther the drug possesses any real remedial powers at all. 
There can, however, be no doubt that when “ mixed with 
brains” it is a medicine of very real and great value. 
Its mode of action can hardly yet be defined with clear¬ 
ness and certainty. Many observers have reported on it, 
but their conclusions have in several cases been perplex- 
ingly contradictory. At present the conclusions arrived 
at by Dr. Robert Amory|| seem most satisfactorily to ex¬ 
plain its therapeutical properties. He considers, from 
his experiments, that the effects of the drug are produced 
by its direct action on the blood-vessels, or the vaso-motor 
system which controls the action of those vessels, and 
that this action can account for and explain all the phy¬ 
siological and therapeutical actions of the drug. He re¬ 
ports that the bromide is easily absorbed by the mucous 
membranes and by the skin, provided that the water in 
which it is dissolved is below the temperature of 75° 
Fahrenheit; that its elimination is conducted by the skin 
and kidneys, and that in therapeutical doses it is not 
eliminated by the intestines or the lungs ; that it passes 
out of the skin without decomposition; that the larger 
the doses the more intense and enduring is the action on 
the vaso-motor system; and that its action upon the 
general nervous system is secondary to and dependent 
upon that of the vaso-motor nerves. Dr. Russell Rey¬ 
nolds also, in a valuable and instructive paper on “ The 
Therapeutic Usesof Bromide of Potassium,”** records his 
opinion that the specific action of the drug “ is exorcised 
on the system of vaso-motor nerves, and that it acts upon 
that system as a sedative.” 
* Abstracted from a series of papers on the Progress of 
Therapeutical Science in the Medical Times and Gazette. 
f Journal de Chim. Med., etc., t. v. p. 214. 
£ Ibid., t. iv. p. 591. 
§ Medical Times and Gazette, vol. i. p. 525, 1857. 
|| American Journal of Medical Sciences, 1869. 
** Practitioner, vol. i. pp. 5-17. 
