STATE OP PHARMACY IN THE UNITED STATES. 277 
shall have undergone a satisfactory examination by the trus- 
tees assisted by the professors. A thesis to be prepared by 
the candidate himself shall also be deposited with the college. 
In 1832 the number of members by their printed catalogue, 
was upwards of seventy, which has doubtlessly increased; but 
I have no means at hand to ascertain the present number. 
An effort was made during the last year to raise funds sufficient 
for the erection of a suitable building, and the purchase of ap- 
paratus, &c. in order that the view of its enlightened and phi- 
lanthropic founders might be carried out. The number of 
graduates up to March 1835 had been fifteen. By a law of 
the State of New York passed in 1832, no person after the 
first of January 1835, is allowed to commence or practise the 
business of an apothecary in the city of New York, without 
having qualified himself to obtain the diploma of this college, 
or having obtained that from some other regularly constituted 
college of Pharmacy or medicine; or having been examined 
by the censors of one of the county medical societies, and 
been furnished by them with a certificate of his qualifications 
for the business of an apothecary. By another law no person 
is allowed to sell arsenic, prussic acid, or any other substance 
usually considered poisonous, without endorsing on it the 
word Poison, in a conspicuous manner. Tartar emetic is also 
required to be conspicuously labelled. This is the only law 
on this subject that I am aware of, in any of the United 
States. 
Among thebenefits derived from the labours of these colleges 
may be stated, that several years since Committees were ap- 
pointed to investigate the formulae employed in the preparation 
of the old English patent medicines, whose labours resulted in 
the substitution for the vague and various recipes employed, of 
formulae based upon a scientific arrangement and disposition of 
the ingredients; and a suggestion to discard the marvellous de- 
tails of cures with which the envelopes or directions were laden, 
substituting in their place a narrative more candid and ingen- 
uous. Reforms are gradually progressing in other branches 
of the profession, which the former debased state of the art 
