58 
Pharmacognosy  and  the  US.P. 
f  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\   February,  1910. 
However,  we  have  a  responsibility  in  these  matters  which  we 
cannot  evade,  and  the  dealers  in  drugs  look  to  us  to  study  the  con- 
ditions and  the  materials,  and  to  furnish  descriptions  and  tests  for 
determining  identity  and  establishing  standards  of  quality  which 
will  be  of  practical  assistance  and  which  they  can  rely  upon  with 
as  much  certainty  as  their  tests  and  standards  for  chemicals.  There 
appears  to  me  to  be  no  reason  why  the  whole  subject  of  the  purchase 
and  sale  of  vegetable  drugs  should  not  at  least  be  on  as  satisfactory 
a  basis  as  that  of  spices.  I  have  sufficient  faith  to  believe  that  when 
the  standards  and  tests  for  vegetable  drugs  are  developed  as  they 
should  be,  or  adopted  even  as  we  know  them  to-day,  there  will  be 
no  more  quibbling  about  the  difficulties  of  obtaining  vegetable  drugs 
of  satisfactory  quality  than  there  is  about  medicinal  chemical-s  at 
the  present  time,  and  that  the  dealers  will  be  glad  for  the  adoption 
of  such  standards.  With  the  establishment  of  fair  standards  it  will 
be  possible  for  importers  and  wholesale  dealers  to  insist  that  the 
garbling  of  drugs  and  the  removal  of  extraneous  matter  shall  be 
carried  on  by  the  collectors  and  distributors  before  thev  enter  com- 
merce. Such  a  procedure  would  be  wholly  in  accordance  with  the 
modern  way  of  handling  problems  of  this  kind.  Why  shall  40.000 
druegists  be  worried  about  gross  adulterations  and  admixtures 
when  these  can  for  the  most  part  be  detected  at  the  point  where 
the  drugs  enter  commerce  and  where  such  pressure  can  be  broup-ht 
to  bear  upon  the  collectors  abroad  as  well  as  in  this  countrv  as  will 
cause  them  to  remedv  deficiencies  in  their  knowledge  of  the  drues 
or  plants  from  which  they  are  derived  and  prevent  continued  care- 
lessness in  their  collection.  T  am  satisfied  that  the  lack  of  uniformity 
in  the  prenarations  of  vegetable  drugs  at  the  present  time,  as  shown 
both  bv  chemical  and  pharmacological  assav,  is  due  to  vanous  fetors 
not  connected  with  plant  growth,  rather  than  to  inherent  variation 
in  the  drnp-s  themselves,  which  usually  only  vary  within  certain 
narrow  limits. 
U.  S.  PHARMACOPOEIA  IX. 
It  has  been  pointed  out  that  in  the  commerce  of  drues  practical 
problems  are  continuallv  arising,  and  hence  the  PharmacoDceia 
should  contain  such  information  as  will  help  in  the  solution  of  these 
problems.  That  part  of  the  U.  S.  Pharmacopoeia  devoted  to  phar- 
macoenosv  has  not  had  a  thorough  revision  since  at  least  1890, 
and  with  the  progress  that  has  been  made  in  applied  pharmacognosy 
