January 21,1871.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
595 
than botany, and as Dr. Synnott and Mr. Shaw have both 
kindly offered valuable prizes in connection with it, 
the latter gentleman having also volunteered to conduct 
an examination, it is thought a good class may be formed 
next Session. 
The Treasurer presented a cash statement showing a 
balance in favour of the Association of £4. 5s. 3 cl., which 
was ordered to be entered on the minutes of the Associa¬ 
tion. A vote of thanks to Dr. Dougall for his kindness 
in conducting the examination of the the students in 
botany ended the meeting. 
GLASGOW CHEMISTS AND DRUGGISTS’ 
ASSOCIATION. 
Seventeenth Session. 
The Seventh Meeting of the Session was held in 
Anderson’s University on Wednesday evening the 11th 
inst.; Mr. T. Davison, President, in the chair. The 
Secretary announced receipt of the Pharmaceutical 
Journal and Chicago Pharmacist as donations. Messrs. 
James Dickie, Crocket, Brodie, M‘Auley and Wallace 
were elected members. 
R. Carter Moffat, Esq., Ph.D., F.R.S.S.A. (honorary 
member), then delivered a highly interesting lecture on 
“ The Detection of Alum in Bread.” He first explained 
some of the many processes recommended by chemists 
for this purpose, stating that for many years it was one 
of the most difficult problems to solve. He then went 
on to say, that some months ago he had been engaged, 
professionally, to report as to whether alum was really 
present in some breads, as alleged. His attention was 
thus drawn to the untrustworthiness of some of the tests 
and the awkwardness of others, and he endeavoured to 
Temedy the matter if possible. After performing nearly 
two hundred experiments, however, the matter seemed 
to him as far from solution as ever. At length he came 
upon the process known as Mr. Horsley’s, of Cheltenham, 
which recommends that a piece of bread be placed in 
vinegar for a short time, the vinegar then to be strained 
off, and a little ammonia added to the clear liquor, to 
neutralize the acid; an alcoholic solution of logwood 
was then to be added, which, it was stated, gave the 
liquor a blue coloration when alum was present. Four¬ 
teen loaves, besides some samples of flour, had been given 
"him for analysis; and, according to Mr. Horsley’s pro¬ 
cess, every one of these contained alum. But on experi¬ 
menting further he (the lecturer) found that the blue 
coloration was produced when no alum was present, 
which led him to the discovery that by far the most re¬ 
liable test for detecting the presence or non-presence of 
alum in bread or flour, was the simple alcoholic solution 
of logwood, without any of the burning, boiling, or other 
processes. He used 120 grains of ordinary chip log¬ 
wood, and digested it for eighteen hours in 8 ounces of 
methylated spirit and filtered it. When the solution is 
brought in contact with bread or flour free from alu¬ 
minum, a pale yellow or straw colour is produced, but 
if aluminum be present the colour turns out a dark red. 
With this test he had found that only one of the fourteen 
loaves contained alum, showing that this substance was 
not so extensively used for whitening bread as had been 
.given out by many chemists and others. The lecturer 
performed some experiments in illustration of his sub¬ 
ject, and at the conclusion was awarded a hearty vote of 
thanks. 
The proposed poison regulations were then considered, 
and in course of a short discussion—in which the feeling 
semed to prevail that chemists generally could not object 
to regulations of some kind being made in regard to the 
keeping of poisons—it was thought advisable to oppose 
them becoming law in their present form, until such 
time as the Government should see fit to place the same 
restrictions upon surgeons and others who keep open 
khop for the dispensing of medicines. A member stated 
ihat he thought if the druggists would agree to the 
regulations independent of the surgeons altogether, the 
public would have greater confidence in going to the 
chemist for their drugs ; but the idea was repudiated by 
most of the members, on the ground that surgeons who 
had shops never allowed their prescriptions to be dis¬ 
pensed elsewhere if they could avoid it; and further, 
because in many of the large towns in Scotland surgeons 
had the cream of the drug business in their own hands ; 
in Glasgow, particularly fully two-thirds of the drug 
retailers being medical practitioners who, it was under¬ 
stood, would be entirely exempt from the restrictions. 
The President and Secretary were instructed to commu¬ 
nicate with some of the other associations, to ascertain 
what action was being taken by them in the matter, and 
also to write to the medical department of the Privy 
Council, explaining the position in which the Glasgow 
chemists will be placed in the event of the regulations, 
as at present proposed, becoming law. The discussion 
was then adjourned till next meeting. 
|}rambrap af Stimtifit Satieties. 
SOCIETY OF ARTS. 
On Fermentation. 
BY PROFESSOR A. W. WILLIAMSON, F.R.S. 
Lecture IV. — continued. 
Amongst the processes which arc detrimental to the 
quality of wine, I have already mentioned the excess of 
air having access to it. That is the one which is most 
known, and against which people least need to be cau¬ 
tioned, but it has been found by wine-growers and wine¬ 
makers, especially in the case of higher-class wines, like 
those of Burgundy and some other districts, are liable to 
particular maladies which produce evils, each one quite 
peculiar and different from the others. Amongst these 
maladies, the first and simplest of all, is acetification, or 
the transformation of the alcohol into acetic acid. That 
is one which is so well known now, and so well under¬ 
stood, that, I think, wine-growers are well able to guard 
against it with tolerable completeness. By the use of 
a microscope, these little acetic cells on the surface of 
the liquid would at once be seen, and you would know, 
of course, that there would then be a tendency in the 
wine to pass over into acetic acid, and that, unless those 
cells are removed, or if they are present, unless oxygen 
be excluded,—because the presence of the cells does not 
of itself make the wine into vinegar, it is necessary 
that they should be present with a continuous supply 
of air,—so that if they are removed, or if you prevent a 
supply of air, that malady is arrested or cured. But 
there is another malady which is well known, and fre¬ 
quently spoken of amongst wine-growers as the “ turn¬ 
ing.” of wine. It is a process which is, in its general 
features, something analogous to acetification, but che¬ 
mically it is very different. When the wine is put into 
casks, it begins to give off gas, and in French they call 
it la pousse; it pushes out the ends of the casks, and, 
if a hole were made, the wine would be ejected with 
considerable force. M. Pasteur has examined not only 
the wine itself when undergoing this process, but also 
the deposit, the little solid particles which are pre¬ 
sent in it, and he has found two things which are 
correlative to one another,—in the first place, that 
there is always present in wine which is suffering 
from this malady certain little films, which can be seen 
quite distinctly by the microscope, and which are dif¬ 
ferent from any particles found under any other con¬ 
ditions, and which he therefore believes to be little 
organic bodies, just as much as in the alcoholic fer¬ 
ment or acetic ferment, and he calls them the ferment 
of the turning or la pousse. That is one fact which is 
established. These little particles are compared in their 
structure to little bamboos, as they consist of little straight 
joints one at the end of the other, the length being con- 
