552 
Process  of  Percolation. 
(  Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
I    Dec.  1,1874. 
formula  that  I  should  offer  for  the  manufacture  of  any  preparation  of 
this  class  ;  nor  do  I  believe  that  the  officinal  process  for  fluid  extracts 
in  our  recent  Pharmacopoeia  meets  the  approval  of  the  majority  of  the 
truly  practical  pharmacists  of  this  country.  I  heartily  endorse  almost 
every  word  written  by  Dr.  Squibb  in  disapproval  of  this  part  of  the 
Committee's  labors.  It  is,  I  consider,  an  unfortunate  change,  and  is 
certainly  a  retrograde  step  ;  for  it  must  be  remembered  that, 
after  the  four  days'  preliminary  maceration  directed  in  the  officinal 
process  is  concluded,  percolation  proper  has  just  began,  and  the  pro- 
cess may  not  be  completed  for  a  day  or  two  more,  which  prolongs  the 
operation  to  almost  half  the  period  required  in  the  old  maceration 
process  for  tinctures  ;  consequently  this  most  wonderful  and  excellent 
process  is  shorn  of  its  greatest  beauty.  The  great  merit  of  the  former 
officinal  process  for  percolation  consisted  in  the  rapidity  with  which 
highly  concentrated  solutions  of  the  active  properties  of  any  drug 
could  be  obtained — a  rapidity  which  excited  the  admiration  and  almost 
the  wonder  of  the  intelligent  pharmacist  himself. 
Pharmacy,  it  must  be  remembered,  is  no  longer  in  its  infancy  in 
this  country ;  it  has  not  only  thrown  off  its  swaddling  clothes,  but  has 
also  outgrown  the  habiliments  of  its  youth,  and  now  steps  forth  in 
the  full  attire  of  manhood,  and  its  ambitious  and  progressive  spirit 
will  not  allow  it  to  sanction  any  backward  step  without  a  murmur. 
In  this  enlightened  age  of  steam  and  telegraph,  and,  I  might  almost 
say,  of  aerial  navigation,  it  is  hard  to  ask  the  ambitious  and  progres- 
sive "  Young  American''  pharmacist,  after  he  has  for  years  enjoyed 
the  benefits  and  advantages  of  the  modern  and  expeditious  method 
of  direct  percolation,  with  all  its  beauties  and  excellencies,  to  return, 
as  it  were,  to  the  very  brink  of  the  old  and  obsolete  maceration  pro- 
cess, of  which  the  present  officinal  one  for  percolation  is  simply  a 
slightly  modified  form.  I  can  assure  my  readers  that  it  will  be  with 
reluctance  that  he  will  thus  return  to  the  slow  and  antiquated  way  of 
doing  thing3  of  his  ancestors.  You  might  as  well  ask  him,  if  he  desired 
to  reach  a  certain  point  by  public  conveyance,  to  take  a  stage-coach  in 
preference  to  a  steam-car,  or  to  take  a  trip  in  a  Conestoga  wagon, 
with  the  inducement  held  out  of  saving  half  fare,  even  though  he  be 
not  in  a  hurry  to  complete  his  journey.  Such  is  the  temper  of  our 
American  people,  a  little  saving  of  expense  is  no  inducement  to 
endure  slow  and  tedious  processes  of  any  kind. 
Besides,  the  process  presented  to  us  by  the  Pharmacopoeia  for  the 
