408 
Wine  of  Beef  and  Iron. 
(Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
\  September,  1915. 
the  amount  of  free  acid  present.  The  best  and  safest  plan  would  be 
to  use  a  ferric  citrate  and  to  reduce  the  free  acid  to  a  minimum." 
Manufacturer  S  responded :  "  We  have  not  found  it  very 
satisfactory,  because  it  continues  to  precipitate  indefinitely." 
"  On  June  14,  1910,  we  made  a  gallon  of  beef,  iron  and  wine  by 
N.  F.  method,  and  one  gallon  by  simply  mixing  the  ingredients  of 
the  formula  without  using  alcohol.  These  were  filtered  on  July  6 
and  again  on  December  14,  1910;  at  that  time  we  thought  the  one 
made  by  N.  F.  method  slightly  better  than  the  other,  but  on  examin- 
ing them  at  this  time  (11/11/11)  we  find  both  have  heavy  precipi- 
tates." 
"  There  may  be  some  beef  extracts  on  the  market  which  would 
cause  less  precipitation  than  the  others,  but  all  that  we  have  tried 
have  given  this  trouble." 
Manufacturer  L  replied  :  "  We  have  had  to  virtually  abandon 
the  marketing  of  this  preparation  owing  to — 
"  First.  It  does  not  meet  the  revenue  requirements  as  to  nitrogen 
content.  This  may  be  due  to  the  rather  high  alcoholic  percentage, 
approximately  25  per  cent." 
"  Second.  There  is  a  copious  precipitation  which  soon  renders 
the  preparation  unsightly,  and  the  profession  will  not  accept  it, 
sending  it  back  to  the  manufacturer  about  as  fast  as  it  can  be  sent 
out." 
"  Evidently  the  preliminary  treatment  in  the  N.  F.  of  adding 
alcohol  to  the  solution  of  beef  extract,  filtering  and  distilling  off  the 
alcohol,  is  given  for  the  purpose  of  avoiding  subsequent  precipitation 
in  the  finished  product.  Whether  it  accomplishes  this  I  am  unable 
to  say  definitely,  but  my  impression  is  that  it  does  not.  However,  it 
does  cause  such  a  loss  of  albuminous  material  that  the  product  falls 
short  of  the  revenue  requirement  for  nitrogen,  and  consequently  it 
should  be  omitted  or  modified." 
The  above  abstracts  from  correspondence  with  some  of  the  large 
manufacturers  show  conclusively  the  necessity  for  a  formula  that 
will  overcome  the  defects  in  the  present  N.  F.  formula.  Without 
going  into  all  of  the  details  of  my  experiments,  the  conclusions  only 
are  here  presented : 
The  preliminary  treatment  precipitates  out  considerable  proteid 
matter  and  removes  only  a  portion  of  the  sodium  chloride.   It  has  no 
