456 
Reviews, 
f  \  ni.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\  September.  1897. 
from  end  to  end  of  the  island.  The  humblest  dooryard  may  be  gay 
with  tall  poinsettia  trees,  and  bougainvilleas  may  pour  a  torrent  of 
magenta  leaves  from  every  tree,  wall  or  roof.  The  houses  of  the 
rich  planters  about  Buitenzorg  are  ideal  homes  in  the  tropics,  and 
the  Tjomson  and  other  great  tea  and  coffee  estates  are  like  parks. 
The  drives  through  their  grounds  show  one  the  most  perfect  lawns 
and  flower  beds  and  ornamental  trees,  vines  and  palms,  and  such 
ranks  on  ranks  of  thriving  tea  bushes  and  coffee  bushes,  every  leaf 
perfect  and  without  flaw,  every  plant  in  line,  and  the  warm,  red  earth 
lying  loosely  on  their  roots,  that  one  feels  as  if  in  some  ornamental 
jardin  (V acclimatation,  rather  than  among  the  most  staple  and  serious 
crops  of  commerce.  Yet  from  end  to  end  of  the  island  the  culti- 
vation is  as  intense  and  careful,  entitling  Java  to  its  distinction  as 
"  the  finest  tropical  island  in  the  world."  It  is  the  gem  of  the 
Indies,  the  one  splendid  jewel  in  the  Netherlands'  crown,  and  a  pos- 
session to  which  poor  Cuba,  although  corresponding  exactly  to  it 
geographically  and  politically,  has  been  vainly  compared. 
REVIEWvS  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTICES. 
Incompatibilities  in  Prescriptions.  For  students  in  pharmacy  and 
medicine  and  practicing  pharmacists  and  physicians.  By  Edsel  A.  Ruddiman, 
Ph.M.,  M.D.,  Adjunct  Professor  of  Pharmacy  and  Materia  Medica  in  Vander- 
bilt  University.  First  edition,  first  thousand.  New  York  :  John  Wiley  & 
Sons.    London  :  Chapman  &  Hall,  Ltd.  1897. 
Part  I  treats  of  incompatibilities,  taking  up  the  various  substances  in  alpha- 
betical order,  beginning  with  acacia  and  ending  with  zinc. 
Each  substance  has  its  behavior  towards  the  various  pharmaceutical  and 
chemical  reagents  described  briefly,  and  with  this  information  the  physician  or 
pharmacist  is  supposed  to  be  able  to  decide  on  the  incompatibilities  of  the  sub- 
stance he  proposes  to  put  into  a  prescription.  In  most  cases  of  official  sub- 
stances, he  would  do  better  to  consult  the  U.  S.  Pharmacopoeia,  where  he  would 
find  tests  that  will  almost  always  give  a  clue  to  the  incompatibilities  without 
being  obscured  by  a  large  number  of  tests  and  properties  which  are  of  doubtful 
value  when  true,  and  which,  in  many  cases,  are  not  true. 
It  appears  to  us  that  Part  I  is  top-heavy  with  quotations  from  Muir  and 
Morley's  edition  of  Watts'  Dictionary.  This  is  just  about  the  last  authority  we 
should  have  thought  of  consulting  on  a  pharmaceutical  subject.  For  instance, 
of  what  value  is  it  to  one  compounding  a  prescription  to  know  that  morphine 
is  oxidized  by  an  alkaline  solution  of  potassium  permanganate,  forming  an 
acid;  or  that  potassium  ferricy an ide  oxidizes  morphine  to  pseudo-morphine, 
when  the  conditions  necessary  for  the  reactions  are  such  as  are  not  liable  ever 
to  occur  in  compounding  prescriptions  ? 
The  author  has  succeeded  much  better  when  he  has  quoted  Allen  or  Prescott. 
