58 
ON  EFFERVESCING  POWDERS. 
too  easily,  and  for  this  reason  acts  too  quickly  on  the  tartrate 
so  as  to  form  carbonate  of  ammonia,  it  is  not  fit  to  answer  the 
purpose  of  having  the  reaction  going  on  in  the  stomach  so  that 
the  powder  may  pass  the  organs  of  smell  and  taste  without  ex- 
hibiting anything  but  a  salinous  taste  ;  the  dry  carbonate  of  soda 
then  takes  its  place,  on  account  of  its  similar  action  and  its  slower 
solubility ;  even  carbonate  of  lime  might  be  used  in  some  cases  ; 
the  powder  should  be  mixed  in  syrup  and  given  at  once,  but  care 
should  be  taken  not  to  direct  an  excess  of  carbonate  of  soda, 
which  might  developeits  caustic  properties  in  the  stomach.  Tar-  , 
trate  of  ammonia,  with  which  I  have  experimented  a  short  time 
ago,  I  believe  to  be  a  far  more  stable  salt  than  is  usually  sup- 
posed, but  other  salts  such  as  the  sulphate  and  muriate  can  be 
used  in  lieu  thereof ;  it  should,  however,  never  be  left  out  of  sight 
that  with  these  powders  a  double  decomposition  takes  place,  and 
that,  for  instance,  a  mixture  of  carbonate  of  lime  and  sal  am- 
nion he  would  be  inadmissible,  on  account  of  the  formation  of 
chloride  of  calcium.  One  part  of  exsiccated  carbonate  of  soda 
would  suffice  for  one  and  three-quarter  parts  of  the  neutral  tar- 
trate, one  and  a  quarter  of  sulphate  and  one  part  of  muriate  of 
ammonia. 
Whenever  medicine  is  administered,  it  ought  not  only  to  be 
prepared  nicely,  but  appearance  and  taste  ought  to  be  made  as 
agreeable  as  possible,  so  as  to  please  the  eye,  and,  if  possible, 
the  palate  of  the  invalid.  Very  often  has  the  pharmaceutist 
occasion  to  take  notice  of  some  behavior  of  medicines  in  this  re- 
gard, often  he  may  be  interested  sufficiently  to  make  some  ex- 
periments for  the  sake  of  information,  and  thus  arrive  at  some 
satisfactory  results.  We  know  sugar  has  been  tried  to  mask  the 
taste  of  disagreeable  medicines,  aromatics  and  spirits  have  been 
tried,  but  for  some  in  vain.  The  effervescing  powder  seemed  to 
be  one  means  that  had  not  been  sufficiently  tried  yet,  and  a  de- 
sire to  find  a  more  pleasant  way  for  administering  ammonia,  has 
also  lead  to  the  experiments  with  iron  to  discover  a  way  to  ad- 
minister it  in  the  state  in  which  it  occurs  in  most  of  the  chaly- 
beate springs.  These  are  the  reasons  for  having  undertaken 
these  investigations  ;  if  the  result  and  the  suggestions  expressed 
will  inspire  others  to  a  trial  of  pushing  forward  in  this  direc- 
tion, the  results  might  probably  be  very  satisfactory. 
From  the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Pharmaceutical  Association. 
