Arayr^879.rm"}  Mercurial  Ointment.  295 
distinctly,  that  it  is  the  very  device  figured  and  described  by  Mr.  Drew 
which  does  not  belong  to  him  in  any  sense  whatever,  except  that  lie 
was  the  first  to  think  it  worthy  of  being  made  the  subject  of  a  pub- 
lished note. 
Had  this  been  the  first  time  that  Mr.  Drew  had  overlooked  mention- 
ing in  his  published  papers  what  was  due  to  others,  no  notice  would 
have  been  taken  of  it ;  but  while  he  was  employed  by  this  writer,  Mr. 
Charles  Rice  drew  our  attention  jointly  to  the  foreign  notices  of  phenol- 
phtalein  as  an  indicater  in  acidimetry,  and  gave  to  this  writer  a  specimen 
of  phenol-phtalein  for  trial.  One  of  the  results  of  this  was  a  paper 
by  Mr.  Drew,  published  in  this  journal  for  November,  1878,  in  which 
the  previous  use  of  phenol-phtalein  as  an  indicater  is  alluded  to,  if  at 
all,  in  so  equivocal  a  manner  that  in  the  republications  of  Mr.  Drew's 
article  he  gets  credit  for  what  does  not  belong  to  him,  while  the  com- 
mon courtesy  of  acknowledging  our  joint  indebtedness  to  Mr.  Charles 
Rice,  of  Bellevue  Hospital,  for  his  information  and  his  supply  of 
phenol-phtalein  is  entirely  omitted. 
Again  in  this  journal  for  December,  1878,  is  an  article  by  Mr.  Drew 
on  Sodium  Salicylate,  the  whole  substance  and  value  of  which,  if  there  be 
any,  belongs  to  this  writer.  Mr.  Drew  asked  this  writer  for  permission 
to  publish  this  working  process,  and  permission  was  willingly  and  cheer- 
fully given  him.  But  his  moral  sensibility  should  have  guarded  him 
from  publishing  it  entirely  as  his  own,  when  it  was  not  his  own  in  any 
other  sense  than  in  being  permitted  to  publish  it. 
Brooklyn^  May  9th,  1879. 
Note. — With  the  above  communication  we  consider  this  contro- 
versy closed. — Editor  Amer.  Jour.  Phar. 
MERCURIAL  OINTMENT. 
By  Phil.  Hoglan,  Ph.G. 
During  the  month  of  April  I  had  occasion  to  make  some  mercurial 
ointment,  and,  being  in  a  hurry,  had  resort  to  the  following  process  : 
First,  extinguished  the  mercury  by  triturating  with  about  one-tenth  of 
its  weight  of  old  mercurial  ointment  and  a  small  quantity  of  the  lard. 
During  the  trituration  allowed  the  suet  and  the  remainder  of  the  lard  to 
melt,  and  then  strained.     By  the  time  the  mixture  became  almost  stiff 
