Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
May,  1884. 
Reviews,  etc. 
303 
Elements  of  Pharmacy,  Materia  Medlca  and  Therapeutics.  By  William 
Whitla,  M.  D.  (Q.  U.  I.),  etc.  With  lithographs  and  wood  cuts.  Second 
edition.    London  :  Henry  Renshaw,  1884.   12mo,-pp.  602.   Price  10s.  6d. 
This  is  a  work  intended  for  the  medical  student,  and  for  the  use  of  phy- 
sicians who  may  be  required  to  prepare  medicines,  rather  than  for  that  of 
the  pharmacist ;  yet  even  the  latter  may  find  useful  and  practical  hints  in 
the  first  100  pages,  which  are  devoted  to  pharmacy,  and  give  explanations 
in  regard  to  the  various  pharmaceutical"  manipulations,  utensils  and  prepa- 
rations, and  suggestions  concerning  difficulties  to  be  more  or  less  frequently 
met  with  in  dispensing.  Part  II.,  occupying  124  pages,  contains  an  alpha- 
betical list  of  the  drugs  and  chemicals  of  the  British  Pharmacopoeia,  and 
with  each  the  preparations  into  which  it  enters.  In  each  case  a  few  descrip- 
tive words  are  added,  which,  though  insufficient  to  fully  characterize  the 
article,  serve  to  point  out  some  of  the  leading  physical  properties  ;  brief 
outlines  of  chemical  processes  are  given,  together  with  the  dose  and  the 
strength  of  each  preparation.  Part  III.  is  devoted  to  the  therapeutics  of 
the  medicines  enumerated  before ;  and  Part  IV.  to  non-pharmacopoeial 
remedies,  the  arrangement  in  both  cases  being  alphabetical.  Part  V.  treats 
of  the  administration  of  medicines,  including  the  writing  of  prescriptions 
and  giving  several  autograph  prescriptions,  with  translations  into  un- 
abbreviated Latin  and  English.  Part  VI.  gives  the  principal  tests  of  iden- 
tity and  purity  of  the  more  important  remedies,  tables  of  weight  and 
measures,  and  of  poisons  and  their  antidotes. 
The  work,  it  will  be  observed,  covers  an  extensive  ground,  and  the 
information  conveyed  must  necessarily  be  brief  and  often  fragmentary  in 
that  portion  of  it  in  which  the  pharmacist  is  specially  interested  ;  yet  we 
believe  that  it  serves  a  very  useful  purpose  in  the  hands  of  those  for  whose 
information  it  was  written. 
Review  of  the  Drug  Trade  of  New  York  for  the  Year  1883.  Prepared  by 
D.  C.  Bobbins,  Esq.,  for  the  Twenty-sixth  Annual  Report  of  the  Cham- 
ber of  Commerce  of  the  State  of  New  York. 
Commercial  statistics,  if  carefully  collected,  are  of  undoubted  value.  In 
noticing  previous  reports  by  Mr.  Bobbins,  we  have  occasionally  pointed 
out  the  fact  that  certain  chemicals,  which  are  extensively  used  and  which 
were  formerly  largely  imported,  are  now  exclusively,  or  nearly  so,  manu- 
factured in  the  United  States  for  home  consumption  ;  we  have  also  occa- 
sionally referred  to  the  increase  or  decrease  in  the  importation  of  certain 
drugs.  We  now  take  from  the  report  the  following  figures,  showing  the 
importation  of 
Opium, 
Cinchona.  Quinine.  Opium.  for  smoking. 
In  1878  4,826,290  lbs.  17,594  oz.         207,752  lbs.  54,805  lbs. 
In  1883   3,639,315  lbs.  1,055,764  oz.  229,012  lbs.  298,153  lbs. 
The  amounts  imported  of  the  second  and  fourth  articles  have  steadily 
increased  during  the  six  years,  while  the  importation  of  opium  has  fluctu- 
ated very  little,  exceeding  the  last  amount  in  two  years  by  14,000  and 
nearly  50,000  lbs.,  and  reaching  385,060  lbs.  in  1881.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  importation  of  cinchona  bark  reached  its  maximum  in  1879,  with 
6,389,378  lbs.,  and  has  rapidly  fallen  off  after  1880.  We  believe  that  these 
figures  furnish  material  for  reflection. 
