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PHAHMACEUTICAL MEETING, EDINBURGH. 
A meeting was held in St. George’s Hall, on Tuesday evening, 16th current, at nine 
o’clock; Mr. Kemp, President, in the chair. There was a very good attendance. The 
President introduced Mr. Morrison, Dentist, who made the following communica¬ 
tion :— 
Mr. President and Gentlemen,—Your worthy Secretary, Mr. Mackay, with his usual 
desire to do good, by bringing under your notice anything calculated to be of use to the 
members of the Pharmaceutical Society, has asked me to describe to you these moulds. 
I need not say that it affords me very great pleasure indeed, to comply with his most 
polite request. Before, however, entering on the subject, perhaps you will kindly allow 
me a few minutes to explain how it happens that I appear here this evening in the 
capacity of a mould-maker. In the interest of a friend, who every day of his life is 
obliged to use suppositories, I have from time to time applied to Mr. Noble, druggist, 
Circus Place, to supply these most useful articles. One day, while talking over the 
manufacture, that gentleman kindly let me into the secret of how they were made. 
The disclosure of the idea of making holes in a lump of clay, with a stick, to serve as 
moulds to make hundreds of pharmaceutical products, so tickled my fancy that I believe 
I smiled all over, very much to the annoyance of my friend Mr. Noble. Mr. Noble, 
sticking up for the dignity of the profession, brought me suddenly back to my propriety 
by telling me that, however primitive I might think the affair, clay moulds were “ the 
best things out.” Notwithstanding this supposed, or, if you like it better, suppository 
settler, it did not settle me; it occurred to me that, nevertheless, I could and would 
make some little improvement. Whether I have succeeded is not for me to say, but 
you to settle. 
The ordinary method of making these productions by means of clay moulds seems to 
me to have three very distinct disadvantages. The first is, that, even though with care, 
one might manage to make clay moulds serve some little time, there will always be the 
great drawback of the shrinking of the clay, which, rendering the moulds irregular in 
form, will tend to prevent the perfect delivery of the product or casting. The second 
objection to clay moulds is, that clay, being a very bad conductor of heat, can never 
admit of any mould, however perfectly made, delivering as fast as filled. The third 
objection arises from the fact that, as all clays shrink irregularly^ no two castings from 
clay moulds can ever be alike, or either of them true to any form. Besides, the mang¬ 
ling of the cast substance itself,—the result of a rough, irregular mould,—there is the 
washing and dressing of the product aftirwards, which product, notwithstanding all the 
care taken in the get up, never can, by any possibility, be said to be good-looking. 
To aid in making articles exact in size, and consequently a no less exact measure or 
weight of the substances used, and to be in keeping with the general neatness of all 
pharmaceutical productions, is the object of these moulds, which I shall now very briefly 
describe. I may here state that there are two reasons why the description is so. One is, 
that the moulds are, in construction, so perfectly simple, that you have only to look at 
them to find them speaking for themselves. Another reason is, that while I beg leave 
of the Society to present it, with the plan, patterns, drills, and cutters, for the use of 
any of its members, Mr. Noble, with his usual desire to oblige, has kindly consented to 
at all times show the finished article, so that no one can ever be at any loss how to pro¬ 
ceed in the making. 
To guide those, however, who wish to be first in the field, I may here state that there 
are three patterns, two drills, and two cutters. The three patterns give six castings of 
the best gun-metal, there being, as marks, two castings from each pattern. The larger 
cutter is used without any drilling ; the smaller cutter after the larger drill. The small 
drill is used to make the holes for the steady pins, and for the jointing of both moulds. 
Mr. Morrison, in illustration of his remarks, submitted a set of the moulds both for 
pessaries and suppositories. They were made of gun-metal, and beautifully finished. 
He also laid upon the table different kinds of suppositories and pessaries, all of which 
had been made by the moulds then under examination. These productions were very 
much admired, and the meeting was unanimous in thinking that the mode now pro¬ 
posed for the manufacture of these articles was at once the quickest and readiest way of 
making them which had been hitherto invented. Mr. Morrison presented the steel 
cutters, moulds, etc. to the Society. 
