Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
June,  1920. 
Revision  of  the  U.  S.  Pharmacopoeia. 
381 
Circulars  to  General  Committee 
Letters  to  Executive  Committee 
2000  pages  (9  X  16  inches) 
3417  pages  (8V2  X  II  inches) 
Bulletins  to  members  of  Sun-commit- 
tees from  the  chairmen  (members 
of  the  Executive  Committee) 
5557  pages  (8V2  X  11  inches) 
These  latter  figures  are  underestimated,  for  no  record  is  obtain- 
able for  three  of  the  sub-committees,  and  no  account  whatev^er  is 
taken  of  the  voluminous  personal  correspondence  which  was  car- 
ried on  by  or  between  members  throughout  the  entire  progress  of 
the  work. 
The  first  task  to  be  accomplished  was  the  selection  of  the  sub- 
stances for  inclusion  in  the  revised  work.  This  duty  was  assigned 
to  the  Sub-committee  on  Scope,  which  made  five  preliminary  re- 
ports from  December  8th,  1910,  to  March  i  ith,  191 1.  Some  changes 
were  subsequently  made  as  new  conditions  arose  necessitating 
modification  or  alteration  of  previous  action.  When  the  book 
finally  appeared,  however,  the  sum  total  of  changes  in  monographs 
amounted  to  sixty-seven  additions  and  two  hundred  and  forty- 
three  deletions.  There  are  seven  hundred  and  eighty- two  titles 
and  monographs  included  in  the  official  substances  in  Part  I.  In 
Part  II  there  are  three  hundred  and  thirty-nine  test  solutions  and 
reagents  described  and  a  number  of  special  descriptive  articles 
covering  general  processes  or  subjects,  together  with  numerous 
tables  of  value. 
In  the  progress  of  the  work,  the  following  procedure  was  fol- 
lowed in  the  main.  A  tentative  monograph  was  submitted  to  the  sub- 
committee to  which  that  particular  substance  had  been  assigned,  by 
its  chairman,  and  comments  and  suggestions  invited.  The  chairman 
of  the  sub-committee  would  then  draft  a  new  monograph  embodying 
the  changes  suggested  and  again  submit  it  to  the  members  of  the  sub- 
committee. This  procedure  was  repeated  until  a  monograph  was 
found  to  satisfy  the  members  of  the  sub-committee.  During  this 
stage  of  the  work,  the  chairmen  of  the  sub-committees  who  were 
members  of  the  Executive  Committee,  reported  monthly  to  the 
Chairman  of  the  General  Committee  of  Revision  upon  the  status 
of  the  work  in  their  respective  sub-committees.  When  a  group  of 
monographs  satisfactory  to  a  sub-committee  had  been  collected  by 
its  chairman,  these  were  submitted  to  the  Executive  Committee 
through  the  General  Chairman  and  comments  and  suggestions 
invited.    Sometimes  the  monographs  with  their  criticisms  would  be 
