io8  The  Letter  of  the  Law.    '  {AmiT;wTm' 
full  medicinal  value  of  their  tinctures  prepared  from  the  normal 
liquid  of  nux  vomica,  Judge  Reed,  nevertheless,  decided  in  the  first 
case  that  such  tinctures  were  adulterations  within  the  meaning  of 
the  New  Jersey  statute,  since  the  requirement  of  2  per  cent,  dry 
extractive  was  not  fulfilled !  In  the  second  case,  some  misgivings 
must  have  begun  to  assail  the  judicial  intellect,  since  the  case  still 
hangs  suspended  in  the  limbo  of  the  undecided. 
But  if  the  Judge  showed  an  undue  tenacity  in  clinging  to  an 
obsolete  standard,  and  a  disposition  to  apply  the  narrow  letter  of 
the  law,  our  Pharmacopoeia  Commission  have  taken  a  very  different 
view  of  the  question.  In  the  revised  edition  (1890)  we  are  happy 
to  observe  a  radical  change  in  the  requirement  made  of  tincture  nux 
vomica  :  it  is  no  longer  2  per  cent,  of  extractive,  but  rather  0-3  per 
cent,  of  total  alkaloids — the  identical  alkaloidal  content  which  the 
manufacturers  of  the  normal  liquid  had  long  adopted  as  their  own 
standard  for  the  tincture.  The  new  Pharmacopoeia  became  a  part 
of  the  New  Jersey  law  on  Jan.  1,  1894,  thus  depriving  the  cases  of 
all  legal  basis. 
While  we  may  now  smile  at  the  emphatic  way  in  which  time  has 
rejected  the  decision  of  the  New  Jersey  Court,  it  is  obvious  that  its 
very  absurdity  from  a  medical  and  pharmacal  point  of  view  was  not 
without  a  compensating  benefit  in  promoting  the  adoption  of  a 
rational  standard  for  this  and  a  few  other  important  preparations 
in  the  new  Pharmacopoeia.  Inasmuch  as  five  of  the  witnesses  for 
the  defendants  were  likewise  members  of  the  Revision  Committee, 
the  agitation  imparted  to  the  question  of  standardization  by  the 
nux  vomica  cases  were  unquestionably  an  active  agent  in  the 
pharmacopceial  changes  thus  far  introduced — changes  which,  it  is  to 
be  hoped,  will  be  multiplied  until  every  potent  official  remedy  shall 
be  provided  with  a  standard  which  will  guarantee  a  uniform  medicinal 
action. 
The  introducers  of  normal  liquids  may  well  feel  content  with  the 
handsome  vindication  which  their  enterprise  has  received  at  the 
hands  of  the  Pharmacopoeia  Commission,  and  with  the  high  compli- 
ment embodied  in  the  recent  adoption  of  their  well  known  standard 
for  the  official  tincture. 
