February io, 1872.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
655 
any colour with, samaderin; hence it appeared that this 
substance was quite different from the bitter principle of 
Quassia , the allied plant. 
Mr. Collins said that Dr. De Yry had directed atten¬ 
tion to the important fact that the fruit was much better 
than the bark'. This should be remembered, because the 
trees were being destroyed in Java and other places for 
the sake of the bark. 
The President said that he was not aware that this 
hark had ever been introduced into England before, 
though in India it was used as a febrifuge, under the 
name of Niepa bark. 
With regard to the taste of samaderin, Dr. Attfield 
said that, to his palate, the solution of that substance 
was more bitter than a corresponding solution of sul¬ 
phate of strychnia. 
Mr. Umney remarked that the taste resembled that of 
Quassia; and Mr. Williams drew attention to the fact 
dhat this substance did not produce that peculiar bitter 
taste at the back of the mouth which was so character¬ 
istic of strychnia. It appeared to be a clearer bitter. 
The next meeting was announced for March 6th. 
NORTH BRITISH BRANCH PHARMACEUTICAL 
SOCIETY—EDINBURGH MEETING. 
The Third Meeting of the present session took place in 
Craigie Hall, on Wednesday evening, January 1st, at 
8.30 ; Mr. Ainslie, in the unavoidable absence of the 
President, in the chair. 
Mr. Baton read the following paper on “ The Museum: 
its Position and Requirements— 
The present time—when the Council of the North 
British Branch contemplates a complete reorganization of 
its whole establishment, and is engaged in seeking suit¬ 
able premises as head-quarters for Scotland—offers a very 
favourable opportunity for drawing the attention of 
members to that most important feature of the institu¬ 
tion—the Museum. It is the one feature which must 
«nter. largely into all considerations regarding suitable 
premises, for, whereas a considerable collection of books is 
not difficult to accommodate so that it may be made 
Available to readers, and the necessities of the Board of 
Examiners have already made themselves evident, the 
museum, on the other hand, cannot, unfortunately, he 
.said to figure in a manner that makes the disposal of the 
specimens it at present contains a matter of very serious 
concern. It is therefore now the more essential.Ghat 
the Society should have before it, not what the Museum 
is, but what it ought to be, and what members are 
resolved to make it. It appears to me that the future 
position of the North British Branch will, to a great ex¬ 
tent, be determined by the importance and value of the 
Museum collections it may establish. 
Before referring to the present position of the Museum, 
permit me to make one remark on the general question. 
There are museums and museums; such institutions may 
be classed in ascending series, from penny peep-shows 
up to the British Museum. Leaving out of account the 
lower members of the series, museum collections may be 
divided as to their functions into three classes. Firstly, 
they serve tor general popular instruction; secondly, 
they provide stores for the strictly technical and scien¬ 
tific student; and thirdly, their collections provide ma¬ 
terial for the advancement of scientific knowledge, and 
for devising new applications and uses of known prin¬ 
ciples and substances, as well as the discovery of the 
value of what may hitherto have been unapplied. The 
museum of this branch, it will be seen, does not fall to 
be considered at all under the first head, and very little 
under the third ; its first and chief object is to provide 
full and efficient means of instruction in the professional 
department of pharmacy. Being thus not intended in 
any degree as a popular resort, the necessities of the 
museum, in the way of good light and cases and ample 
space for exhibition, are by no means so great as are the 
requirements for a full series of typical specimens, ar¬ 
ranged in the manner that an orderly-minded student 
should prosecute his studies. In this way, also, large 
and striking specimens are not _ so desirable as such as 
are truly characteristic and most faithfully represent 
those substances the qualities of which they are intended 
to exhibit. The Society, therefore, can save money upon 
show-cases and fittings, which it might properly expend 
upon providing that such cases as it may have shall be 
well filled. 
At the time I was first appointed to the charge of the 
Museum, and when the printed list of specimens was pre¬ 
pared, there were in the collection about 120 specimens 
of chemical substances, over 340 examples of vegetable 
materia medica, and of animal products only 24 specimens. 
The great bulk of these specimens had been presented by 
friends of the museum in this locality ; but among them 
there are some collections of considerable value, which 
had been sent from a distance. Among these, as of 
special value, ought to be mentioned the complete series 
of the cinchona barks of commerce, presented by Messrs. 
Howard and Kent, and a fine series of chemicals, pre¬ 
sented by Mr. W. Heathfield. The museum has also 
been indebted to Professor Archer, of the Museum of 
Science and Art, for a series of the Magdeburg salt-mine 
minerals and other specimens, and Sir Robert Christison 
and Professor Douglas Maclagan have frequently shown 
their good-will by presenting excellent specimens. It is 
manifest that with such a limited series of specimens, no 
great amount of arrangement would be required, and the 
one difficulty they occasioned, was the impossibility of 
grouping them in any systematic shape. No such group¬ 
ing has, therefore, been attempted further than sepa¬ 
rating the chemical, animal and vegetable substances; 
and these, with a little further breaking down, have been 
arranged in a highly arbitrary manner. It was judged 
that to attempt a botanical classification of such an in¬ 
complete series of vegetable substances would be of no 
practical value. Since the list was printed several valu¬ 
able acquisitions have been made, among which are a 
very interesting and complete illustration of the metal 
thallium and its salts, from Messrs. Hopkin and Williams, 
and a series of dried native plants prepared and presented 
by Mr. Ransom, of Hitchin, which may form the nucleus 
of a herbarium collection,—a very desirable feature for 
such a museum as that of this Society. 
What it is desirable to aim at in the Museum I have 
already to some extent hinted. The first and most pressing- 
duty of the Society here is, as possessed of an examining 
board, to provide the most ample means possible for 
facilitating the professional education of the candidates 
who come up for examination. It is evident that it is 
both unfair and unwise to examine men on subjects and 
regarding substances they have no means of becoming 
practically acquainted with. The Museum cases should 
illustrate all these as far as possible, and means should 
be taken to let it be known that such facilities for ac¬ 
quiring knowledge exist. But the acquisition of specimens 
should not cease w-ith the fulfilment of this object, any 
more than the studies of the pharmaceutist should end 
with passing his examinations. As the lesser examinations 
only represent the minimum of knowledge considered in¬ 
dispensable for the qualification of members, so such a col¬ 
lection would indicate the very least number of specimens 
that could be looked upon as a museum collection. It 
would, indeed, be very difficult to point to anything in 
the vegetable kingdom which -would not find a suitable 
place in a pharmaceutical museum; and all forms of 
models and apparatus for teaching botany or for illus¬ 
trating it as a science, would be of great value in such 
collections, having primarily an educational aim._ Dia¬ 
grammatic illustrations of botany^ collections of dried and 
mounted plants and models of the more perishable fruits 
and other products, could all find place in the Museum 
at little cost and with great benefit to those consulting 
