October 28,1871.] 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
351 
fermentire principles are now largely used to assist na¬ 
ture in the piocess of digestion. That these principles 
are identical vith those secreted in the human interior, 
there is little loubt, but that they really have the large 
effect in the presence of the living stomach that is 
claimed for them, is, I submit, open to doubt. 
Perhaps the most important of all technical chemistry 
is the utilization of waste materials ; and, fortunately, it 
has been of late years greatly progressive. The history 
of large chemical works is generally that each accumu¬ 
lates enormous stocks of some waste material, which at 
last becomes such a nuisance that the owners are com¬ 
pelled to adopt some means of working it up. The pro¬ 
cess invented for the purpose of ridding ourselves of a 
nuisance often turns out a source of profit; such, for in¬ 
stance, are the utilization cf soda-waste by Mond’s pro¬ 
cess, and the recovery of manganese from avaste still 
liquor by Weldon’s process. Deacon’s new process for 
the preparation of chlorine from hydrochloric acid by 
dissociation, bids fair, however, to supersede the use of 
manganese altogether. The manufacture of soap, too, is 
likely to undergo a considerable change if Professor 
Morfit’s method of combining the alkali as carbonate 
direct with the fatty acid, and superheating to free the 
carbonic acid be generally adopted. The process is a 
very perfect one, and the soap can be made and finished 
in a few hours. 
I wonder what Sir Humphry Davy would have said 
to any one who talked about stellar chemistry. That 
great man, in ridiculing the idea of lighting London with 
gas, triumphantly asked the fanatics who proposed such a 
wild scheme, whether the dome of St. Paul’s was to be the 
gasometer ? Yet we cannot imagine Regent Street illu¬ 
minated, or rather darkened, with dips again, and to us 
stellar chemistry has a real meaning. Who will venture 
to bound a science which reaches far away through space, 
and with unerring accuracy tells us the composition of 
distant worlds and distant suns ? What can be more 
humiliating to our small intelligences than the reflection 
that a distant star will photograph its spectrum on a 
sensitive surface with the ray of light that left it when 
the oldest man in this room was a boy P What would 
the great father of British chemistry have said had he 
stood in the lecture-room of the Royal Institution, where 
his great discoveries were made, and seen the burning 
hydrogen extracted by your great countryman Graham, 
from a meteorite, the heat and light of another world P 
or could he look with Lockyer on the burning flames of 
hydrogen, which dart up from the sun a height of 50,000 
miles; or could he read the flashing telegrams which 
run so rapidly round our world, that all our notions of 
time are completely upset, and we actually receive in¬ 
telligence to-day which was sent to-morrow ? Excuse 
the apparent absurdity, it only shows how powerless 
language is to keep up with human progress. Could he 
have lived with us and seen a large city dependent en¬ 
tirely for its communication with the outer world by a 
marvellous kind of photography, so minute that it enabled 
a pigeon to carry a proof-sheet of the Times under its 
wing. 
Could Sir Humphry Davy now stand in our favoured 
position and see all these advances, he might, indeed, 
admit with Newton that he had simply played as a child 
on the seashore, while the great ocean of truth lay un¬ 
explored before him. 
In technical pharmacy, what advantages are now 
given by the use of steam and gas ! Steam, gas and 
water enable us now to carry out preparing processes 
which were impossible before their introduction. 
Coffey’s curious application of high temperatures in 
stoneware by convection or circulation of highly heated 
paraffin oil well deserves attention; it may be found 
specially useful in evaporating some of those corrosive 
liquids which can only be heated in stoneware vessels, 
the heating of which is always difficult. 
I am glad to notice some recent improvements in 
tincture presses,—no apparatus is more susceptible of 
improvement; there is great need of a small economical 
hand-press, which would combine the strength of the 
hydraulic press with the sustaining power of the screw, 
and need little attention. Two presses lately described 
in the Pharmaceutical Journal appear to me import¬ 
ant improvements. 
Some improvement ought to be made in our measure¬ 
ment of doses; a drop, a teaspoonful, a wine-glass, are 
terms far too indefinite and various to bo always em¬ 
ployed in the administration of medicine, and we shall 
owe much to the inventor of a better system—a worse 
would be difficult to obtain. 
No study can be more interesting than materia me- 
dica; to know the history of every substance that passes- 
through the hands of the pharmaceutist adds an interest 
to his work, which must be felt to be understood. Every 
day, from all quarters of the globe, are new medicinal 
substances coming forward; perhaps we even too much 
neglect the valuable productions of our native soil. 
Acclimatization of plants is being largely studied ~ T 
several plants are on their trial in India and some of 
our other colonies. Of course, as in chemistry so in 
materia medica, the interest centres in quinine. A 
quinine famine is a thing we dare not think of, the idea 
is too horrible. The Indian Government cinchona 
plantations are flourishing, and we may expect them 
some day to be our chief sources of supply, if, mean¬ 
time, the laboratory does not rise up in competition with 
them. 
There is a largo field open in this country to the pa¬ 
tient student, in the effects of soil, culture and climate; 
on medicinal plants. Any one in the country with com¬ 
mand of a small garden, would be amply repaid by 
making this his study. There is a large range of most 
valuable medicinal plants, natives of our own country,, 
which should all be made the subject of experiments. 
The effects on the medicinal properties of various ma¬ 
nures, of judicious leaf and root pruning where the fruit 
is required; of encouraging the foliage where the loaves 
are used,—these are important questions that have- 
scarcely received any attention. 
When we read of the enormous sums realized by 
madder crops, and even by tho cultivation of beet in 
France, it seems that profit as well as knowledge might 
be the result of such inquiries. 
Will no one tell us the cause of that enormous loss 
we annually sustain, this year worse than ever, by the- 
ravages of the potato disease ? No doubt it is a blight, 
but the existence of that blight shows that the plant is 
unhealthy, and points to the remedy of obtaining alto¬ 
gether new seed. I am satisfied from my own observa¬ 
tion that over-manuring and local seed are strong pre¬ 
disposing causes to the disease. The subject has not- 
been sufficiently studied; the problem is still open to 
some patient observer, and with its solution, the proud 
position of proclaiming to a grateful country the means- 
of increasing its food supply. 
The analysis of drugs and chemicals must always bo 
an interesting study to the pharmaceutist, if only from 
the power it gives him of checking adulteration, and 
ensuring the purity of his materials. 
And now a passing word on botany. I look on this- 
science as an absolute necessity to every pharmaceutist 
but it is such a delightful and such an easy study, and 
Providence has so strewn our paths with its beautiful 
illustrations, that no other inducement ought to be re¬ 
quired to capture the inclination of all. No walk cam 
be lonely where you meet so many well-known friends- 
of the animal or vegetable kingdom. I do not wish to* 
undervalue my fellow-men, but there is more pleasure 
and more instruction to me amongst the floral paths and 
woods and forests of tho country, than in jostling through 
the crowded streets of a city. Man made the town and 
God made tho country; there is no time for reflection in. 
our busy workshops, and if “ one touch of nature makes* 
