114     CONTRIBUTION  TO  STATISTICS  OF  DRUG  POWDERING. 
The  following  recipe,  given  us  by  Mr.  John  Cramer,  of  this 
city,  is  the  form  most  employed. 
Take  of  Lycoperclon  bovista,  four  troy  ounces. 
Boiling  water,         four  fluid  ounces. 
Stronger  alcohol,      twelve  fluid  ounces. 
Macerate  the  powder  in  the  water  for  twenty-four  hours,  then 
add  the  alcohol,  and  having  mixed  them  by  agitation,  macerate 
for  a  week.    The  time  may  be  shortened  by  percolation.  Thus 
made,  this  tincture  is  a  dark-reddish  brown  transparent  liquid, 
of  which  the  dose  for  an  adult  is  a  teaspoonful. 
A  CONTRIBUTION  TO  THE  STATISTICS  OF  DRUG 
POWDERING. 
By  Thomas  J.  Covell,  of  Brooklyn,  N.  Y. 
The  following  table  exhibits  the  principal  results  of  a  small 
business  done  in  powdering  drugs  for  druggists,  during  the  past 
year  or  more,  at  a  mill  where  much  care  is  taken  to  ensure  the 
best  practical  results. 
The  drugs  were  all  of  fair  quality.  No  mixing  or  substitution 
was  practised,  and  in  preparing,  drying  and  powdering,  due  care 
was  taken  to  avoid  as  much  as  possible  injury  to  the  medicinal 
properties  of  the  drugs,  by  heating  and  other  bad  management 
too  common  in  this  business. 
No  bad  or  sophisticated  drugs  of  any  kind  were  ground,  nor 
were  any  lots  admitted  to  the  drying  table  whose  condition  of 
dryness  or  moisture  is  very  uncommon  in  the  markets  ;  the  aim 
being  to  present  a  fair  statement  of  what  the  average  results  are 
in  articles  of  fair  merchantable  quality. 
Such  articles  as  ergot,  myrrh,  valerian,  etc.,  and  the  classes 
they  represent,  were  always  powdered  under  protest,  and  vfith.  a 
clear  statement  to  the  owners  of  the  deterioration  which  is  inevi- 
table in  such  articles  when  powdered.  Such  drugs  as  cubebs, 
ergot  and  oily  substances  in  general,  were  refused  when  required 
in  powder  so  fine  as  to  require  drying  of  the  drug  ;  the  coarser 
powders  in  such  articles  being  always  the  best,  other  things  being 
equal. 
The  table  is  in  two  divisions  of  four  columns  each.    The  first 
