Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
June,  1915. 
Druggist  and  Veterinarian. 
257 
For  general  anaesthesia,  use  ether  for  cat  and  dog,  chloroform 
for  the  horse.    It  is  almost  impossible  to  etherize  a  horse. 
The  best  purgative  for  the  horse  is  aloes,  but  it  must  be  of  Bar- 
badoes  type;  i.e.,  must  give  a  rose-red  reaction  with  tincture  of 
iodine  in  dilute  aqueous  solution. 
Don't  ask  for  an  explanation.  Cape  or  Socotra  aloes  does  not 
give  as  good  results,  and  aloin  is  not  to  be  relied  upon  as  a  substi- 
tute for  aloes.  Don't  give  croton  oil  or  gamboge  to  a  horse  unless 
the  drugs  are  prescribed  by  a  veterinarian.  For  cattle  the  salines, 
Epsom  or  Glauber  salts,  are  the  best  purgatives. 
Dogs  get  castor  oil  and  buckthorn  or  cascara,  and  the  same  reme- 
dies may  be  given  to  cats. 
A  good,  rough  way  to  estimate  the  dose  of  aloes  for  the  horse  is 
to  allow  a  thousand  pounds  of  weight  per  ounce  of  drug,  and  add  or 
subtract  a  drachm  for  every  hundredweight  over  or  under  that 
standard. 
It  may  be  useful  to  know  that  light  diet,  bran  mashes,  etc.,  help 
the  action  of  equine  purgatives. 
For  superpurgation  pulv.  creta  aromat.  in  two-  to  three-ounce 
doses,  in  whiskey  and  water,  will  be  found  useful. 
Now  I  am  going  to  touch  on  a  somewhat  mooted  subject:  Pre- 
scribing by  the  druggist. 
As  an  old  druggist,  I  know  that  if  you  do  your  whole  duty  to  your 
community  you  must  sometimes  prescribe,  and  I  am  frank  to  say  that 
in  many  cases  you  do  so  with  just  as  much  care  as  the  doctor. 
If  I  stop  in  my  physician's  office  and  tell  him  that  I  have  caught 
a  little  cold,  and  he  hands  me  a  bottle  of  cough  syrup,  ready  put  up 
for  him  by  a  wholesaler,  and  tells  me  to  take  a  teaspoonful  three  or 
four  times  daily,  he  is  not  prescribing  for  me  more  intelligently 
than  would  the  druggist  if  he  handed  me  a  fifty-cent  bottle  of  Jones's 
Pulmonic  Balsam  with  directions  printed  on  the  label. 
If  a  lady  customer  rushes  in  and  tells  you  her  dog  has  con- 
vulsions, and  you  prescribe  full  doses  of  bromides  and  order  the  dog 
wet-packed,  you  may  help  the  owner,  the  dog,  and  the  veterinarian. 
If  a  customer  asks  for  turpentine  to  treat  a  nail  wound  in  a 
horse's  foot  you  are  justified  in  suggesting  the  use  of  an  immuniz- 
ing dose  of  tetanus  antitoxin,  and  you  can  increase  your  business 
and  get  the  good-will  of  your  veterinary  customers  by  posting  your- 
self on  {he  use  of  veterinary  biologicals  and  passing  on  the  knowl- 
edge as  occasion  serves.   If  called  on  to  prescribe  for  a  case  of  colic, 
