July 29,1871.] 
97 
T1IE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
*** No notice can be taken of anonymous communica¬ 
tions. Whatever is intended for insertion must be authenti¬ 
cated by the name and address of the writer ; not necessarily 
for publication, but as a guarantee of good faith. 
The Pharmacy Bill. 
Sir,—Until the last number of the Pharmaceutical 
Journal appeared I had allowed myself to hope that, upon 
the abstract question of legislative interference with the inter¬ 
nal arrangements of our shops, all chemists were of one mind. 
I thought that one and all alike deprecated such legislation, 
believing each individual member of t heir fraternity to be com¬ 
petent to frame all requisite precautions for the safety of the : 
public and the security of his own means of living, without 
the intervention of any law upon the matter. I imagined 
the difference of opinion which existed amongst us to consist 
mainly in this—that whereas some thought that an opposite 
opinion being held by the public and the Privy Council, and 
the power of the latter being irresistible, it behoved us to ! 
yield the principle, and to accept the best terms we could get; 
others, on the contrary, considered that the public was simply 
misinformed, that the contemplated intrusion of the Privy 
Council was capable of being resisted, and that the principle 
business independence was worth fighting for. 
In ranging myself, therefore, with those who proceeded to 
"resist the action of the Privy Council, I believed, not only that 
I was helping to do battle for the honour of the whole trade, 
but that if we in any way succeeded in our object the whole 
itrade would rejoice. 
To a very considerable extent we did succeed, for the Bill 
was withdrawn “ with the general approval of the House,” and 
there is every probability that, had the whole trade been 
united in principle (as I had thought was the case), it would 
have died the death it deserved. At any rate it w r as with¬ 
drawn, and I looked for a general expression of content. 
But the last Journal contained a letter and a document sin¬ 
gularly the reverse of what I had hoped to see. 
In the first place, I am thereby proved to have been quite 
wrong in supposing w T e had the secret sympathy of our pro¬ 
fessed opponents, for we now find that ail the efforts we were 
making to enlighten our parliamentary representatives, and 
to persuade them to treat us with some respect, were at the 
same moment being thwarted by a circular, signed by some of | 
the best-knowm names in the trade, whicii kissed the hands 
•of the framers of the Bill, and begged hon. members to pass 
it into law. This v r as no very pleasant discovery; but the 
revelation displays something more—for the publication of j 
this circular, with the names appended, a week after the 
withdrawal of the 13111, leads to the almost necessary in- 
ference that these gentlemen intend for the future openly to 
.advocate the very principle against which we have been 
struggling. They no longer affect to be trying to make the 
best of a bad job, but they join issue with us on the principle 
itself, and assert that the job is a good job; to quote their 
own words, “ they presume to point out how completely the 
objections to the Bill have been removed (by the amendments) 
and trust hon. members will support it accordingly.” 
I am grieved beyond measure at the course taken by 
Mr. Sandford and his friends (I am taking fur granted that 
he had their consent to publish the document as he has done), 
inasmuch as the elevation of such a standard within the ranks 
■of our own body cannot but be regarded by many of us as 
sheer treason, and must create a ground of division emphatic 
in proportion to the emotions such a word is likely to 
arouse. G. P. Schacht. 
Clifton , July 24th, 1871. 
Sir,—I take leave to recommend your correspondents not 
fo fan the expiring embers of the poison regulations; leave 
them alone and depend upon it these will soon go out. ' 
"Weigh the pretensions of JDr. Simon in the scale with the 
powerful inliuenee which the chemists throughout the land 
have commanded in Parliament, by reason of the fairness and 
justice of their cause, and those pretensions will bo found as 
dust in the balance. The few who feel they cannot conduct 
their business with security to themselves and safety to the 
.public without being bound in a Parliamentary strait-jacket, 
J earnestly urge at once to consult Dr. Munro. 
Kilburn, July 24th. John Beaton. 
Sir,—You properly deprecate a continuance of the recent 
conilict of opinion on the Pharmacy Bill, and every true 
friend of the Society will re-echo your sentiments ; you speak, 
however, with bated breath, feeling, probably, that tire circular 
of Mr. Sandford would be promptly repudiated. As Presi¬ 
dent of the Hull Chemists’ Association, it is within my know¬ 
ledge that the circular has caused a strong feeling of dissatis¬ 
faction,—the general impression here being that any man 
who could deliberately append his name to such a document, 
understands very little of the principles for which w r e in the 
provinces so determinately struggled. In my judgment the 
parts of the Bill eliminated were as small dust in the balance, 
compared with the real and weighty grievances which re¬ 
mained. The opening sentence of this strange circular states, 
that “ in 1803 the Society had to resist as strongly as possible 
the introduction of restrictive clauses, which would have se¬ 
riously fettered chemists in their daily avocations;” and it 
winds up with the following, in italics :—“ We have presumed 
to point out to you how completely the objections to the Bill 
have been removed, and trust you will support it accord¬ 
ingly.” Who could suppose that the Bill, of which the signa¬ 
tories speak so complacently and which they are so anxious 
to embrace, is still partial in its operation—omitting surgeons, 
hospitals, dispensaries, etc.—and contains compulsory, penal 
and disqualifying clauses; surely the force ol inconsistency 
can no further go! We shall continue to struggle against 
harsh and uncalled-for legislation, whether Parliamentary or 
Pharmaceutical, and I am satisfied w'e shall have not only 
(he trade, but the public with us. I will only add that the 
effect of the circular in Hull has been to determine us to 
organize an association, including East and North Yorkshire 
and North Lincolnshire, the object of which will be, “the 
protection of the public against the risk arising from com¬ 
pulsory fancy regulations and the defence of the trade against 
penal and restrictive enactments, until at least a primd facie 
case for legislation has been established.” 
Upon those, who by their acts are provoking the renewal 
of a fruitless contest, must rest the responsibility for the mis¬ 
applied time, energy and money which might otherwise have 
been devoted to Pharmaceutical education. 
Hull, July 2btk, 1871. James Baynes. 
Sir,—The success of the opposition to the passing of the 
late Pharmacy Bill is not likely to leave in a captious mood 
those who have so much reason to be satisfied at its with¬ 
drawal. 
At the same time, they will not affect to underrate the im¬ 
portance of the Circular, bearing the signatures of a number 
of chemists, which you published last week. As Mr. Sandford 
writes you that he was the recipient of the signatures given 
to this circular, there can be no impropriety in treating its 
construction and mode of issue as being Mr. Sandford’s. 
The other gentlemen attaching their names have, of course, 
become responsible for tbe document; but it is evident that 
the motives influencing them individually must have been 
widely various. 
To place such a document in the hands of members of Par¬ 
liament upon the day of the second reading w r as, doubtless, 
considered a clever piece of strategy, since the circular dis¬ 
honestly (I speak advisedly) assumes that its promoters were 
persons wlio recognized the faults of the original Bill, and 
who stated the pith of their document in the following 
words,—“ to point out to you how completely the objections 
to the Bill have been removed.” What are we think of per¬ 
sons wlio could use such language, when their every previous 
public w r ord and act had been to defend the original Bill as 
having no faults P However, the treacherous arrow missed 
its mark by the withdrawal of the Bill, and it now affixes to 
public gaze many names which chemists throughout tho 
kingdom see there with sorrow. 
The plain fact is, that Mr. Sandford has set up a new Cave 
of Adullam. The promised prospect of a settlement of a 
vexatious question brought most of its occupants, and from 
a mass of indifferentism he has had considerable success. 
The dramatic effect of using the names of firms as signatories 
wa 3 also cleverly planned; but as regards certain “ historic 
houses,” those having tho legal right to the names ol some 
who were defenders of the liberties of chemists, appear to 
have little regard for the principles held by their prede¬ 
cessors. , . 
We now ask, Why did Mr. Sandford gather together tho 
names of 120 chemists to offer their opinions ? Were they 
representatives of their brethren, or authorized to speak for 
