REPORT ON IMPORTED ADULTERATED DRTTGS. 213 
What proportion do adulterated, misnamed, and vitiated 
articles bear to those that are pure and of the proper 
strength ? 
Answer. More than one-half of many of the most im- 
portant chemical and medicinal preparations, together with 
large quantities of crude drugs, come to us so much adulte- 
rated, or otherwise deteriorated, as to render them not only 
worthless, as a medicine, but often dangerous. 
Name, as far as you can, the articles most commonly 
adulterated, or otherwise deteriorated, the manner of 
adulteration, &c., and the consequent difference in price be- 
tween the vitiated and genuine article, with such other sug- 
gestions as you may deem to pertain to this question ? 
Answer. Opium is at present more frequently adulterated 
with liquorice paste, combined with a bitter vegetable ex- 
tract, likewise with an extract made from the poppy plani, 
with an admixture of the leaves. An article called opium 
is prepared and sold for exportation in the foreign markets, 
composed of liquorice paste, extract of poppy heads and 
leaves, and a small portion of gum iragacanth, and a bitter 
vegetable extract. Another article of opium comes to us. 
more or less, and in some instances, entirely deprived of its 
active principle, the same having been extracted for the 
manufacture of morphine. 
So called opium has passed the New York custom-house, 
within the last twelve months, so highly charged with 
liquorice paste, that not only was the smell very perceptible, 
but on account of the excess of saccharine matter thereby 
furnished, the worthless mass was alive with worms ! 
Some of these adulterations are invoiced as low as one- 
third the price of pure opium, and of course are not worth 
that. 
Calomel is adulterated with chalk, sulphate of barytes^ 
and white lead, and furnished by the foreign maniifacturei 
at about two-thirds the price of the genuine. 
The mercury or quicksilver of commerce is generally 
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