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THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. [February 23 ,137 
same as the diameter of a 'circle bears to the circum¬ 
ference. The capacity of the stone trough in the in¬ 
terior, usually called the “sarcophagus,” was exactly 
four British quarters of wheat. Its length was about 50 
English inches, and exactly T o o 0 * 0 o ooth. of the earth’s 
diameter. The diameter of the earth measured 500,500,000 
inches, so that if the inch were increased in length by 
-j-Jy-jjth part (an amount quite inappreciable) it would 
be exactly ^th of the length of the sarcophagus, and 
go 00 ^ooooth of the diameter of the earth. Such an in¬ 
crease would make a cubic foot of water weigh exactly 
1000 ounces, instead of being supposed to do so, as at 
present. Mr. Allen was firmly impressed with the 
superiority of a decimal system of weights and measures, 
but he thought it would be easier and better to “patch ” 
our present system than to adopt the French. The 
alterations he advocated would not be very extensive, 
and therefore the more likely to be taken up. He would 
propose to make the pound avoirdupois (weighing 7000 
grains) a measure as well as a weight, and it was already 
used by druggists in the form of the sixteen-ounce 
bottle. He then proposed a new weight and measure of 
-Jj lb., which was about the capacity of a wineglass, and 
for which he suggested the name “ verre” (the French 
for glass) or “ver.” A weight and measure Ac of this, 
equal to 70 grains, to be called a “newdrachm” (in one 
word), and which was sufficiently near in value to the 
preseDt drachm to bo at once substituted in the majority 
of cases. A weight and measure ^th of this would be 
equal to 7 grains, and therefore called a “septem.” 
A gallon of water weighs 10 lb., so, if this were made 
a weight as well as a measure, no further change in it 
would be necessary. A weight and measure equal to 10 
gallons would weigh 1001 b., and might be called a 
“hundredweight” and abbreviated as “hwt.” The 
manifest absurdity of calling the present weight of 112 lb. 
a “ hundredweight ” would facilitate the change pro¬ 
posed. A weight and measure equal to 20 hwt., and 
weighing 2000 lb., would replace the present ton of 
2240 lb. It might be called a “ tone,” or, still better, a 
“newton,”—a name indicating its parentage, and re¬ 
calling to mind the great discoverer of gravitation. Our 
system of weights and measure would then stand thus :— 
7 Grains = 
10 Septems = 
10 Newdrachms = 
10 Vers = 
10 Pounds = 
10 Gallons = 
20 Hundredweights = 
1 Septem, S. 
1 Newdrachm, Nd. = 
1 Ver, V. 
1 Pound, lb. or P. 
1 Gallon, G. 
1 Hundredweight,Hwt. 
1 Newton, Nt. 
= 1 lb 
lOOO 
= To lb * 
- lib. 
= 10 lb. 
= 1001 b. 
=2000 lb. 
Of course the half-gallon bottle, or “ Winchester 
quart,” could still be used, and it would be convenient 
to have a |-lb. measure of the capacity of an ordinary 
tumbler (8 oz.), which might be called a “beaker,” 
“rummer,” or “tumbler.” The smaller weights would 
scarcely be employed except by chemists and druggists, 
and could at any time be expressed in decimals of a 
pound. The change to such a system would take place 
with infinitely less opposition and dislike than if the 
French system were adopted. 
The proceedings concluded with a cordial vote of 
thanks to the lecturer. 
MANCHESTER CHEMISTS’ ASSISTANTS’ 
ASSOCIATION. 
The Ordinary \\ eekly Meeting of this Association was 
held in the Council Room, Mitre Chambers, on Thursday 
evening, February 9th. The minutes of the previous 
meeting having been affirmed, a paper was read by 
Mr. Binns upon ‘The Medicinal Use of Vegetables and 
their Preparations.’ The author said that he had lost 
faith in the present system of administration of vege¬ 
tables and their preparations as curative agents, on 
these grounds:—that every plant, or part of a plant, 
which is medicinally useful, owes its active properties 
and action on the human frame to one or to several sub¬ 
stances formed in, and generally peculiar to that plant, 
of which they are said to form the active principle; that 
science is almost dumb as to the mode of formation of 
those active principles and their ultimate cause; and the 
results of all published investigation point to then- un¬ 
certainty in quantity. What is the cause of the medi¬ 
cinal influence of various plants on the human frame ? 
Taking into consideration the undisputed fact, that one 
species of plant produces a different kind of effect on the 
human frame from another species, we are led to the 
conclusion that these effects are due not to any substance 
or substances which the several species possess in com¬ 
mon, such as vegetable fibre, starch, etc., but to some 
substance which occurs in, and is generally confined to, 
each individual species. This inference is borne out by 
the results of chemical investigations into the compo¬ 
sition of the matter of plants; thus nux vomica seeds 
are found to contain a principle to which has been given 
the name of strychnia; atropia has been found, and 
found only in the belladonna plant. Now the physical 
action of these principles has been ascertained by expe¬ 
riment to be mainly and practically the same as that of 
the plants themselves, and on account of this the name 
‘ active principles ’ has been assigned to them. 
He then gave an account of the growth of a plant, and 
argued that just as one man cannot, by reason of his 
very nature, deposit fat or flesh or bone in large quan¬ 
tities, but forms an extra amount of muscle, while 
another man, fed on the same food, developes bone to an 
alarming extent, to the consequent diminishment of his 
muscular fibre,—the same cause operated in the vege¬ 
table kingdom, in varying the proportions of body and 
active principle in each individual plant. Considering 
the vegetable fibre, etc., to correspond to the bone and 
flesh of animals and the active principles, etc., to the 
blood and muscular fibre, facts point to the inference 
that the proportion between them is regulated by the 
organic quality or nature of the seed from which the plant 
sprang. If this be the case, then the weight of a plan 
has no relation to the amount of active and peculiar 
principles which it contains. But the British Pharma- 
copoeia assumes virtually that the amount is exactly the- 
same in each of several plants of the same weight. 
Mr. Binns then read the following results of various ex¬ 
periments on the composition of the substance of plants:— 
Miller’s ‘Organic Chemistry’ tells us that the ’com¬ 
position of opium varies greatly even when it is not 
adulterated; also, that morphia is its principal sedative 
constituent, and its salt, the meconate, forms from one- 
seventh to one-sixteenth of its weight,” which certainly 
leaves a wide margin for variation. 
Thomson, in his ‘Materia Medica,’ states “ There is one 
disadvantage in prescribing opium, that is, we can never 
rely upon the strength of the specimen.” Analyses of 
various kinds of opium yielded the following results to 
various operations:— 
Percentage 
Sample. of Morphia, 
Smyrna.About 8 . 
Egyptian.5. 
Algerian.About 6 ^. 
English.Irregular. 
French and German . . 16 to 20 . 
Indian.3*21-10 - 5. 
Chinese.2 - 5. 
Cinchona barks subjected to analysis with the view of 
ascertaining the amount of quinine and cinchonine con¬ 
tained, gave the following :— 
Sample. Quinine. Cinchonine, 
Best Calisaya . . . 3 ’8 
Middle „ ... 2*5 
Carthagena . . . 1’04 . . 1’35 
Best Red Bark . . 2'65 . . 1’5L 
