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HYDRARGYRUM CUM CRETA. 
ART. L XXI. —REMARKS ON THE PREPARATION OF HY- 
DRARGYRUM CUM CRETA. 
By Edward Jenner Coxe, M. D. ; New Orleans. 
The value of an uniformly perfect preparation of this medi- 
cine in many affections of the bowels, more particularly of in- 
fants, is too well known to require an apology for requesting 
the insertion of these remarks in the Journal of Pharmacy of 
Philadelphia. I am induced to make more generally known 
the following mode of preparing Hydrargyrum cum Creta, 
in consequence of the remarks of Mr. Procter in the April 
number of the Journal of Pharmacy, 1850, upon certain 
changes produced in the article, as well as in the remedial 
effects uniformly anticipated from its administration. 
It appears that the preparation examined and commented 
upon w T as made after the formula of Dr. D. Stewart, of Bal- 
timore, in which a certain proportion of resin was used for 
the purpose of facilitating and expediting the change effected 
by trituration, which by many is thought to consist in mi- 
nuteness of comminution. The usual mode of preparing this 
medicine laid down in the American Pharmacopoeia, and the 
Dispensatory of Drs. Wood and Bache, which should be the 
authority for all American druggists, is to triturate the pro- 
per quantities of mercury and prepared chalk in a mortar, 
until all the globules shall have disappeared. By some, for 
the purpose of facilitating the operation, it is recommended 
to add occasionally a small quantity of water, and by Dr. 
Stewart, a small quantity of resin. This having been satis- 
factorily proved by Mr. Procter to be improper, and the first, 
except at the commencement of trituration, according to my 
experience, retarding instead of hastening the process, I now 
proceed to notice that mode of preparation which must neces- 
sarily result in a perfectly uniform medicine, not to be affected 
by any unlooked-for chemical changes. 
While engaged in the old and tedious process of tritura- 
