5  8o  Minutes  of  the  Pharmaceutical  Meeting.  { iJov!"; i^sJ™^ 
MINUTES  OF  THE  PHApACEUTICAL  MEETING. 
Philadelphia,  October  19,  1880. 
The  meeting  was  called  to  order  by  the  president,  Dillwyn  Parrish.  This  being  the 
first  meeting  of  the  series  an  election  of  a  Registrar  was  ordered,  when,  on  motion 
of  Prof.  Sadtler,  T.  S.  Wiegand  was  re-elected 
The  minutes  of  the  last  meeting,  held  in  May,  having  been  read  and  no  objections- 
being  made  thereto  they  were  approved. 
Prof.  Remington,  on  behalf  of  Dr.  ManliiH  Smith,  of  New  York,  presented  to 
the  College,  for  the  cabinet,  a  specimen  of  the  unripe  fruit  of  the  Conium  ?naculatum^ 
which  is  being  recommended  for  exclusive  adoption  in  the  new  edition  of  the  United 
States  Pharmacopoeia,  and  also  a  specimen  of  Veratrum  viride.  The  thanks  of 
the  College  were  directed  to  be  returned  for  the  same. 
Mr.  W,  B.  Webb  stated  as  a  matter  of  experience  with  the  method  of  preparing^ 
cerates^  noted  in  the  minutes  of  the  last  pharmaceutical  meeting,  that  he  had  failed 
to  obtain  as  good  results  by  the  process  as  with  that  which  is  now  officinal. 
Dr.  F.  B.  Power  exhibited  three  specimens  of  the  oil  of  Asarum  canadense^  one 
by  Schimmel  &  Co.  of  Leipsic,  Germany,  one  by  Dr.  Squibb  and  one  distilled  by 
himself.  This  oil  is  now  made  quite  largely  for  perfumers'  purposes,  in  soap  mak- 
ing, flavoring  tooth  washes,  and  said  also  to  be  one  of  the  constituents  of  Hoyt's 
German  Cologne.  By  fractional  distillation  it  is  separated  into  several  distinct  por- 
tions, that  coming  at  the  lowest  temperature  being  isomeric  with  oil  of  turpentine 
and  the  next  having  the  composition  of  Borneo  camphor.  That  which  is  fractioned 
at  the  highest  temperature  is  at  first  of  an  intensely  blue  color  and  is  doubtless  quite 
complex  in  composition. 
Dr.  Power  also  exhibited  some  specimens  of  the  liquid  constituents  of  oil  of  pep- 
permint.   The  odor  is  due  entirely  to  the  menthol  camphor. 
In  this  connection  Prof  Sadtler  stated  that  in  a  recent  chemical  journal  an  account 
of  a  dispute  relative  to  some  oil  of  mustard  was  noticed.  Messrs.  Schimmel  &  Co..,. 
having  purchased  a  quantity  of  it,  found,  upon  transferring  it  to  other  packages,, 
some  of  it  exploded,  and  examination  proved  that  carbon  bisulphide  was  present 
largely.  This  induced  reclamation  upon  the  part  of  Schimmel,  as  a  fraud  had  been 
perpetrated.  In  reply  it  was  alleged  that  the  oil  was  obtained  by  using  the  seed  of 
the  Sinapis  juncea,  and  not  the  S.  nigra. 
Experiments  made  by  Prof.  Hoffmann,  to  whom  the  matter  was  referred,  as  a, 
chemical  expert,  showed  that  all  oil  of  mustard,  whether  uiade  artificially  or  extracted 
from  any  of  the  varieties  of  Sinapis,  contained  carbon  bisulphide,  but  in  such  small 
proportion  as  to  be  immaterial,  while  the  large  amount  contained  in  the  oil  in  ques- 
tion was  doubtless  put  there  as  an  adulteration. 
Dr.  Power  stated  that  he  had  seen  some  of  this  oil,  which  had  been  sent  to  Prof. 
Fliickiger  for  examination,  and  that  the  conclusion  Prof.  F.  arrived  at  was  that  dis- 
tillation was  the  only  reliable  means  of  determining  tlie  quality  of  such  oil. 
Prof.  Maisch  gave  the  meeting  an  account  of  many  of  the  places  he  had  visited 
while  in  Europe,  stating  that,  his  object  having  been  rest  and  recreation,  he  had  not 
charged  himself  with  sight-seeing  as  much  as  he  would  have  done  had  he  gone 
abroad  for  a  different  reason.     He  had  visited  a  number  of  pharmaceutical  schook- 
