EDITORIAL. 
87 
drugs  effectually,  but  to  preserve  the  important  active  ingredients  in  solu- 
tion with  the  least  possible  tendency  to  change  in  keeping,  by  variation 
in  season  and  climate.  Some  of  the  preparations  of  Tilden  &  Co.,  who 
chiefly  employ  sugar  as  an  antiseptic  for  these  fluid  extracts,  have,  it 
appears,  proved  unequal  to  resist  the  unfavorable  influence  of  tropical 
heat,  and  the  editors  of  the  "  New  Orleans  News  and  Hospital  Gazette," 
having  become  cognizant  of  some  of  these,  have  commented  on  them  with 
more  severity  than  justice,  more  bitterness  than  truth. 
Urged  on  by  the  ambition  of  enterprize,  this  house,  having  earned  a 
character  for  good  preparations,  determined  to  enlarge  yet  more  the  scope 
of  its  productions ;  not  satisfied  with  getting  a  large  share  of  the  business 
of  making  extracts  for  the  supply  of  pharmaceutists,  they  go  further,  and 
claim  to  divide  these  extracts  into  doses,  and  sugar-coat  them,  thus  strip- 
ping from  the  business  of  pharmacy  one  of  its  most  legitimate  functions. 
It  is  the  misfortune  of  such  enterprizes  that  they  cannot  remain  stationary. 
They  must  retrograde  or  advance  by  an  increasing  production  of  novelties  ; 
more  and  more  complex  and  unwieldy  becomes  the  machinery  of  business, 
till  some  of  its  distant  movements  get  clogged  by  accidents  flowing  from  its 
complexity.  Such  has  been  the  experience  of  the  Messrs.  Tilden.  An 
accidental  substitution  of  pills  containing  tartar  emetic  for  Plummer's  pills, 
having  occasioned  some  inconvenience  to  a  patient,  it  was  followed  by  an 
analysis  and  exposure.  This  house  admits  its  custom  of  making  up  special 
formulae,  varying  from  officinal  usage,  to  meet  special  demands,  and  in  this 
instance  some  of  the  modified  Plummer's  pills  containing  an  equivalent  of 
tartar  emetic  became  accidentally  substituted  for  true  Plummer's  pills.  This 
result  should  be  a  lesson  and  caution  to  all  such  manufacturers  to  confine 
their  operations  to  legimate  channels.  The  New  Orleans  editor,  and  some 
others  who  have  commented  on  the  operations  of  this  house,  have  taken 
special  offence  at  their  announcement  of  an  improved  compound  cathartic 
pill  without  calomel.  The  compound  cathartic  pill  is  strictly  an  officinal 
preparation.  Without  calomel  it  ceases  to  be  "  the  compound  cathartic 
pill,"  and  Tilden  &  Co.  have  no  just  right  to  assume  the  name  of  this 
valuable  preparation  to  get  into  use  a  substitute,  when  it  must  be 
apparent  to  every  one  who  reflects,  that  it  tends  to  sanction  that 
strong  prejudice  that  exists  throughout  sections  of  this  country  against 
mercurial  preparations,  and  especially  among  the  numerous  botanic  and 
Eclectic  doctors  and  their  patrons.  If  the  legitimate  demand  of  their 
commerce  requires  the  production  of  such  a  pill,  let  them  supply  it,  but 
give  it  a  proper  name.  If  there  is  any  manufacturing  house  in  this  country 
which  owes  its  success  to  the  countenance  of  the  medical  profession,  it  is 
Tilden  &  Co. ;  though  to  their  own  enterprize  in  bringing  their  preparations 
to  the  notice  of  physicians,  this  recognition  is  mainly  due  ;  hence  none 
should  be  more  conscientiously  careful  to  keep  to  the  well  defined  path 
of  pharmaceutical  rectitude  in  making  their  products.    We  wonder  that 
