Am'ociV\m&im'}  Revision  of  the  U.  S.  Pharmacopoeia.  467 
tee  of  revision,  assured  in  advance  the  scientific  character  of  the 
work,  but  there  is  no  lack  of  evidence  of  the  want  of  that  practical 
knowledge  of  the  pharmacy  of  to-day  acquired  only  by  personal 
contact  with  customers. 
That  errors  should  have  crept  into  a  book  of  such  vast  scope  and 
numerous  titles  is  but  natural,  and  the  committee  have  added  a  final 
page  of  errata  and  addenda  which  they  have  discovered,  but  these 
are  by  no  means  all.  After  a  careful  examination  of  the  book,  the 
writer  is  forced  to  conclude  that  it  is  far  from  perfect  and  that  the 
mistakes  of  the  present  revision  will  furnish  ample  work  for  the 
revision  of  1900. 
The  typography  of  the  work  and  binding  are  fair  and  the  price  at 
which  the  book  is  sold  is  satisfactory  and  should  tend  to  make  it 
much  more  popular  than  the  previous  revision  of  1880.  From  Jan- 
uary 1,  1894,  it  becomes  the  legal  authority  for  all  official  products, 
and  it  is  to  be  noted  that  official  and  not  officinal  has  been  stamped 
authoritatively  by  the  committee. 
The  present  review  is  offered  from  the  unbiased  standpoint  of  a 
practical  pharmacist,  whose  daily  companion  the  volume  will  be  and 
it  is  supposed  to  be  mainly  prepared  for  the  use  of  this  class. 
I  would  suggest  that,  in  the  future  revisions,  the  proceedings  of 
the  convention  authorizing  that  revision  alone  be  published  as  the 
history  of  the  earlier  conventions  and  pharmacopoeias  can  be 
obtained  from  the  previous  revisions.  This  would  have  eliminated 
ten  pages  from  this  edition.  The  book  is  replete  with  tables  and 
lists  as  aids  in  the  various  calculations  and  testings,  giving  it  much 
the  appearance  of  a  modern  text  book  of  chemistry.  In  this  respect 
very  little  more  could  be  desired,  and  some  might  have  been  here 
omitted  as  they  will  appear  in  the  dispensatories  and  various  com- 
pends.  That  most  practical  and  often  enquired  after  Official  table  of 
doses  is  omitted.  In  the  writer's  experience,  this  is  quite  as  much 
needed  by  our  medical  brethren  as  by  those  of  the  pharmaceutical 
craft.  In  the  table  on  page  LVIII,  we  are  informed  that  the  strength 
of  decoctions  and  infusions  in  the  Pharmacopoeia  of  1890  is  "about 
1  in  5  "  instead  of  1  in  20,  or  about  five  per  cent,  as  in  the  text 
of  the  book.  The  Pharmacopoeia  of  1880,  stated  the  weight  of  a 
fluidounce  of  water  as  455*7  grains,  that  of  1890  states  "  456-392 
grains  at  maximum  density  in  vacuo,"  and  this  method  is  generally 
adopted  in  the  tables.    Scientifically  accurate,  but  the  pharmacist 
