/ 
January 20, 1872.3 
THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
595 
Mr. Wilkinson said, I quite agree with much that 
Mr. Siebold has said, 1 am quite of the opinion that we 
ought not to take apprentices who are unable to pass the 
Preliminary; it is absolutely necessary that they pass it 
.some time or other, and if not passed at first a great deal 
of time is wasted in studying for it which ought to be 
occupied in learning something else. I also fully agree 
with everything he says about the study of botany, and 
think that a great amount of botanical knowledge is re¬ 
quired from the students which is not of the slightest 
use whatever. I cannot imagine why so much impor¬ 
tance is attached to this science, when in actual practice 
■a botanical question hardly occurs to an ordinary drug- 
; gist in a lifetime, and if he can recognize the officinal 
plants in the fresh or dry state, it is quite as much as he 
requires. 
I cannot quite agree with Mr. Siebold about the “pre¬ 
parations’’ question; I do certainly think that a man 
should not be rejected because he cannot recognize cer¬ 
tain tinctures, extracts, or powders, or is unable to tell 
their composition, but at the same time he ought to know 
something about them. I should not expect a young 
man to make the B. P. preparations without the book, 
but still he should know what the ingredients are; and 
after all, what is a man to be examined on if not on 
things he is supposed to be familiar with ? 
As to the instances of good men being rejected, and 
inferior ones being passed, that occurs in all kinds of 
•examinations, and I believe it depends a great deal on 
luck and pluck. An inferior man may meet with ques¬ 
tions at the outset which he answers readily and cor¬ 
rectly ; this gives him confidence, and his examiner a 
good opinion of him, whilst the better man, nervous and 
.flustered to begin with, perhaps stumbles at the first 
question asked him, loses his head entirely, blunders and 
hesitates at every question till he wearies out the patience 
•of the examiners, who are after all only men, and it is 
not much to be wondered at if they do get a little impa¬ 
tient after five or six hours’ harassing work. No doubt 
there is great room for improvement, but I think the ac¬ 
counts we hear depend very much on the success or 
otherwise of the candidate, the rejected one laying all 
the blame on the examiners, whilst those who pass de¬ 
scribe them as being all that is lovely and good. 
Mr. Benger, in proposing a vote of thanks to the 
lecturer, said he was very glad to hear Mr. Siebold’s 
strongly expressed condemnation of the system of cram¬ 
ming, and he hoped with him, that the examiners would 
not slacken their endeavours to distinguish between 
superficial preparation and sound practical knowledge. 
He was disposed to agree with Mr. Siebold as to the . 
comparative uselessness of botanical knowledge to the ' 
ordinary pharmacist of to-day, whilst chemistry, materia ; 
medica, and pharmacy made such pressing claims on his ( 
time and energy. He believed it was Professor Huxley . 
who had recently advocated the omission of botany from , 
the curriculum of medical students, and had argued that ‘ 
dt was as logical to consider the surgeon incompetent to , 
use his lancet or knife until he was thoroughly ac¬ 
quainted with the manufacture of steel, as it was to in- , 
.sist on the physician knowing the “ botany ” of his vege- • 
table remedies. 
Mr. Mum is it ay seconded the vote of thanks, which was 
.carried with acclamation. 
Mr. Siebold briefly replied, and^the meeting termi¬ 
nated. 
GLASGOW CHEMISTS AND DRUGGISTS’ 
ASSOCIATION. 
The second half of Session 1871-72 of this Association 
was inaugurated on Wednesday evening, 10th inst., in 
'the usual place of meeting, Anderson’s University; Mr. 
Thomas Davison, President, in the chair. 
An Address was delivered on the occasion by P. A. 
Simpson, Esq., M.D. (Professor of Medical Jurisprudence, 
Anderson’s University), who chose for his subject, “ Na¬ 
tive Poisons of India.” Amongst the specimens which 
were exhibited and illustrated in course of the address, 
were Indian hemp, datoora, oleander, etc., together with 
a series of the “new safety poison bottle,” presented to 
the Association by Messrs. Lynch and Co., 171a, Alders- 
gate Street, London, E.C. At the conclusion of the ad¬ 
dress, which was listened to with the greatest attention 
by the largest meeting of the Association this session,— 
The Chairman proposed a vote of thanks to Professor 
Simpson, which was very heartily responded to. 
BRISTOL PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION. 
The Monthly General Meeting of the Association was 
held on Friday, January 12th; Mr. Townsend, Presi¬ 
dent, in the chair. 
The minutes of the previous meeting were read and 
confirmed. 
The President read the list of subscriptions he had 
received for the Chicago Chemists’ Fund. 
The meeting being the occasion for the reading of 
papers and discussions upon pharmaceutical subjects, 
Mr. Schacht made a few remarks upon a prescription 
he had had to dispense, consisting of tincture of iodine 
and liquid ammonia, showing that when first mixed the 
highly explosive iodide of nitrogen is formed, which 
requires several hours, and under some circumstances 
days, for solution and conversion into iodate of ammonia. 
He recommended that such a mixture should never be 
sent out until that change had become complete, lest 
any portion, accidentally becoming dry, might explode, 
and create alarm. 
Mr. Giles introduced the subject of the pharmaceu¬ 
tical preparations of nux vomica. He thought that proof 
spirit (or a slightly stronger spirituous mixture, say 2 
parts rectified spirit and 1 part water) was to be preferred 
for preparing the tincture, as it exercised a better solvent 
action upon nux vomica seeds than did rectified spirit, 
also because the tincture so prepared made more perma¬ 
nent mixtures with water when diluted according to the 
usual prescriptions. For the same reasons a dilute spirit 
might be used for preparing the spirituous extract. It 
had not appeared that the quantity of extract was mate¬ 
rially increased when dilute spirit was employed, but 
there was a marked difference in the appearance of the 
product, indicating the presence of constituents not 
extracted by the solvent action of rectified spirit. Spe¬ 
cimens were exhibited in confirmation of these state¬ 
ments and opinions. The paper went on to review the 
pharmacopceial tinctures generally with reference to 
their alcoholic strength, which the author thought was 
deserving of more attention than it appeared to have 
received. Out of the sixty-five pharmacopoeial tinctures 
seven (including the ammoniated and ethereal tinctures) 
were excepted, and the remaining fifty-eight simply 
alcoholic tinctures were divided into two classes, viz., 
1st. The tinctures (43 in number) of crude organic 
products—as barks, roots, leaves, etc. 
2nd. The tinctures (15 in number) of secondary pro¬ 
ducts—as gums, resins, extracts, etc. 
The tinctures of the first class were stated to be gene¬ 
rally of proof strength. 
The tinctures of the second class are generally of 
rectified spirit strength. Proof spirit therefore appeared 
to be employed when a general solvent was wanted; rec¬ 
tified spirit being used for purpose of selection. 
Nux vomica is one of the 43 primary organic sub¬ 
stances which are exceptionally treated with rectified 
spirit, in company with aconite, arnica, capsicum, cubebs, 
pyrethrum, veratrum viride, and ginger, and the reason 
is not obvious. 
It was suggested (as previously stated) that the spi¬ 
rituous strength might be advantageously reduced in the 
case of nux vomica, and a similar investigation might be 
