ON  SUPPOSITORIES. 
197 
those  cases  where  the  materials  directed  are  liable  to  be  deoxi- 
dized or  reduced  by  combination  with  saccharine  matters  ;  calo- 
mel is  a  most  noticeable  instance.  Nitrate  of  silver  is  also  a  sub- 
stance that  is  very  advantageously  made  with  this  material;  pre- 
vious to  being  made  into  a  mass  it  should  be  mixed  with  some  inert 
powder,  to  prevent  a  too  rapid  cauterizing  action  in  the  stomach. 
The  oxalate  of  cerium  is  well  formed  into  mass  by  this  extract. 
Wax  has  been  recommended,  but  it  is  to  be  eschewed,  as  it  is  so 
nearly  unalBfected  by  the  action  of  the  juices  of  the  stomach. 
Pertinent  to  this  subject  of  pill  masses,  excipients,  &c.,  is  the 
propriety  of  constructing  all  the  formulae  for  pills  in  the  phar- 
macopaeia  of  such  quantities  that  the  resulting  pill  masses  should 
be  divided  into  those  numbers  which  are  multiples  of  twelve. 
This  subject  was  very  carefully  and  ably  argued  by  Mr.  Alfred 
B.  Taylor,  in  a  paper  published  in  the  March  number  of  the 
American  Journal  of  Pharmacy  for  1860.  The  advantages  of 
such  an  arrangement  are  obvious  to  those  who  make  the  pills, 
and  all  should  accede-  to  any  change  which  is  harmless,  if  by 
doing  so  the  formulae  are  rendered  more  easy  of  execution.  Ail 
the  pill  machines  in  use  by  apothecaries  are  designed  to  enable 
them  to  make  twelve,  eighteen  or  twenty-four  pills,  so  that  to 
increase  or  diminish  any  officinal  formula  based  upon  such  a 
scale  merely  requires  the  continued  duplication  or  binary  divi- 
sions of  such  quantities. 
An  examination  of  the  nineteen  formulas  shows  that  there  are 
six  different  series  which  cannot  be  reduced  to  each  other  by 
simple  duplication  or  halving. 
The  change  proposed  almost  precludes  the  chance  of  error,  and 
therefore  is  so  much  the  more  desirable. 
Philada.,  March,  1870. 
ON  SUPPOSITORIES. 
By  Saml.  p.  Wright. 
An  Inaugural  Essay  Presented  to  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy. 
Suppositories  have  been  in  use  for  many  centuries.  Hippoc- 
rates, who  lived  between  the  years  460  and  357,  B.  C,  used 
cathartic  suppositories,  which  were  composed  of  honey,  soap, 
