I72 
New  Device  for  Perforating  Plasters.  {^m^;^rm'' 
in  depreciating  the  quality  of  the  plasters  furnished  until  now  in  the 
case  of  belladonna  plaster  (probably  the  most  used),  the  principal 
manufacturers  of  rubber  combination  plasters  will  each  furnish  a  plaster 
labeled  in  bold  type  belladonna  plaster,  which  they  will  admit  contains 
no  belladonna  extract.  They  do  sell  a  higher  priced  plaster  which  pro- 
fessedly contains  the  officinal  proportion — but  does  not  this  policy  tend 
to  sow  distrust  in  the  minds  of  buyers  ?  How  can  a  conscientious 
pharmacist  dispense  them  as  standard  goods  when  he  knows  that  plas- 
ters stamped  with  a  lie  are  sold,  and  that  he  has  no  means  of  knowing 
the  true  from  the  false  without  an  investigation,  which  would  not 
occur  to  every  one  to  institute,  and  then  the  facts  in  the  case  are  usu- 
ally reluctantly  admitted. . 
It  is  owing  to  the  lack  of  medicinal  effect  in  manufactured  plasters 
that  physicians  in  many  sections  prefer  to  undergo  the  inconvenience, 
of  the  hand-made  plaster,  and  prescribe  it  because  they  feel  sure  of 
getting  what  they  want,  and  the  writer  has  endeavored  to  supply  one 
deficiency  in  the  hand-made  plaster  by  the  following  device,  whereby 
any  apothecary  may  porous  the  plaster  which  he  has  spread,  irrespective 
of  its  size  or  shape  or  material  upon  which  it  is  spread. 
This  device  or  tool  consists  of  a  brass  cylindrical  wheel,  fin.  wide,  f- 
in.  in  diameter,  with  two  circular  depressions  turned  out  of  each  end,  J 
in.  deep,  leaving  a  hub  on  each  end  of  wheel,  through  which  a  steel 
axle  passes  into  the  prongs  of  steel  handle,  which  is  driven  into  an 
ordinary  tool  handle  9  inches  long. 
The  cylindrical  wheel  is  studded  with  16  punches,  arranged  on  either 
side  \  in.  apart  alternately  ;  these  punches  are  of  steel,  tapered  and  are 
\  in.  long,  and  \  in.  bore^at  the  end  making  a  \  in.  perforation. 
