^iS'.^ot-'111*}    National  Formulary  as  a  Legal  Standard.  359 
isting,  and  the  writer  will  have  to  limit  this  criticism  to  types  of 
errors  with  a  few  specific  illustrations. 
In  the  Pure  Food  and  Drugs  Act  passed  by  the  New  Jersey 
Assembly  (Laws  Session  of  1907,  Chapter  217),  in  the  operatic 
language  of  the  day,  the  druggists  of  the  State  have  been  handed 
a  lemon.  This  act  deems  as  adulterated  a  drug  sold  under  or  by  a 
name  recognized  in  the  United  States  Pharmacopoeia  or  National 
Formulary,  if  it  differs  from  the  standard  of  strength,  quality  or 
purity  as  determined  by  the  test  laid  down  in  the  United  States 
Pharmacopoeia  or  National  Formulary  official  at  the  time  of  the 
investigation.  It  makes  it  an  offence  to  distribute  or  sell,  or  manu- 
facture for  distribution  or  have  in  possession  with  intent  to  distribute 
and  sell  such  article  or  drug,  under  a  penalty  of  $50  for  the  first 
offence,  $100  for  the  second,  and  $200  for  the  third  and  each  subse- 
quent offence. 
With  such  a  stringent  and  unnecessarily  harsh  law  confronting 
us,  is  it  not  imperative  that  the  pharmacists  insist  that  our  legal 
standards  be  correct,  and  that,  at  the  earliest  date  possible,  the 
National  Formulary  be  revised  by  a  competent  committee  with  the 
view  to  its  legal  standing  and  instructed  to  change  its  scope  and 
formulas  so  as  to  make  them  a  satisfactory  authority  ? 
The  authors  of  the  National  Formulary  have  already  published  a 
list  of  corrections  of  errors  and  three  reconstructed  formulas,  but 
this  by  no  means  covers  all  of  the  existing  errors  or  of  the  formulas 
that  are  in  need  of  reconstruction. 
On  critically  examining  the  volume,  one  is  impressed  with  the 
clumsy  and  unscientific  way  in  which  quantities  are  frequently  given, 
especially  in  the  alternative  quantities  stated  in  the  apothecaries' 
system.  The  word  "  troy "  ounce  is  incorrectly  used  for  the 
"  apothecaries'  "  ounce  throughout  the  entire  volume,  and  the  occur- 
rence of  such  state'ments  as  2^  troy  ounces,  51^  troy  ounces,  iS^ 
fluidounces  is  common.  It  certainly  would  have  been  more  in  keep- 
ing with  pharmacopceial  example  and  correct  pharmaceutical  custom 
to  have  stated  these  fractions  in  drachms,  grains,  fluidrachms,  and 
minims. 
While  the  preliminary  notices  explain  that  "  the  alternative  quan- 
tities are  proportional,  but  not  identical,  and  therefore  not  inter- 
changeable with  the  metric  quantities  given,"  it  is  but  fair  to  assume 
that  in  any  single  formula  two  equivalents  of  the  fluidounce  should 
