Am  Jour.  Pharm  ) 
Sept.,  1879.  J 
Reviews,  etc. 
479 
terested  kind  when  he  asks  what  drug  store  to  buy  his  prescription  at, or  what  estab- 
lishment to  patronize.  In  common  trading  such  commissions  are  usual,  and  every- 
body knows  it;1  but  in  the  professions  they  are  discreditable,  and  should  be 
unknown. 
Physicians  have  much  to  say  of  the  impropriety  of  druggists  prescribing  for  the 
sick  ,•  of  their  repeating  prescriptions  without  authority  ;  of  their  putting  up  and 
selling  proprietary  medicines;  of  their  vending  adulterated  medicines,  and  various 
other  tricks  of  the  trade,  but  to  our  minds  the  druggists  could  often  make  strong 
points  against  the  greed  of  the  physicians  to  obtain  percentages,  the  freqnent  unne- 
cessary prescribing  of  compounds,  their  dispensing  and  sale  of  medicines  in  their 
offices,  and  other  practices  not  more  praiseworthy.  Let  us  try  to  remove  this  beam 
from  our  own  eye  before  we  become  pressingly  anxious  to  extract  the  mote  from  the 
optic  of  the  druggist. 
REVIEWS  AND  BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTICES. 
Laboratory  Teaching,  or  Progressive  Exercises  in  Practical  Chemistry.  By  Charles 
Loudon  Bloxam,  Professor  of  Chemistry  in  King's  College,  London  ;  in  the 
Department  of  Artillery  Studies,  Woolwich,  and  in  the  Royal  Military  Acad- 
emy, Woolwich.  Fourth  edition,  with  89  illustrations.  Philadelphia  :  Lindsay 
&  Blakiston,  1879.    iamo,  pp.  261.    Price,  $2. 
From  a  teacher  of  the  experience  of  Mr.  Bloxam  a  useful  and  practical  work  on 
the  subject  of  his  specialty  may  be  expected,  and  the  work  before  us  comes  up  to 
this  expectation.  Devoid  of  theoretical  speculations,  the  book  proceeds  at  once  to 
its  object  of  instructing  in  the  recognition  of  chemical  compounds,  beginning  with 
the  simple  and  gradually  proceeding  to  the  more  difficult  ones.  Since  the  book  is 
intended  for  beginners,  a  knowledge  of  chemistry  aud  an  acquaintance  with  chem- 
ical manipulations  is  not  presupposed ;  but  it  aims  at  teaching  chemical  facts  from 
the  reactions  observed,  and  at  directing  the  attention  to  the  various  manipulations 
when  they  are  required  in  the  course  of  instruction.  These  descriptions  of  manip- 
ulations are  without  exception  clear  and  to  the  point,  though  brief.  The  method 
of  instruction  differs  somewhat  from  that  which  we  believe  is  most  frequently  fol- 
lowed, in  this,  that  tables  for  the  analysis  of  unknown  substances  are  given,  each 
one  being  followed  by  confirmatory  tests,  and  by  descriptions  of  the  substances  and 
their  compounds  to  which  the  table  refers.  Not  only  the  metals  and  mineral  and 
common  organic  acids,  but  likewise  the  more  important  alkaloids,  and  a  num- 
ber of  neutral  substances  are  referred  to  and  methods  given  for  their  detection. 
About  40  pages  of  the  book  are  devoted  to  analysis  by  the  blowpipe,  a  subject 
which  is  often  too  much  neglected.  The  book  is  well  adapted  for  systematic  study, 
and  as  such  we  heartily  recommend  it. 
The  Advantages  and  Accidents  of  Artificial  Anaesthesia.    A  Manual  of  Anaesthetic 
Agents  and  their  Employment  in  the  Treatment  of  Disease.    By  Lawrence 
1  We  question  the  correctness  of  this  assertion,  for  the  paying  of  commissions'  to  brokers  is  merely  a 
■compensation  for  services  performed,  while  surreptitious  receiving  of  so-called  commissions  by  salaried 
employees  is  as  dishonorable  in  common  trading  as  it  should  be  in  the  professions. — Editor  Amhr.  Jour. 
Phar. 
