198 BRITISH AND UNITED STATES PHARMACOPOEIAS. 
mercury under the name of Hydrargyri Sulphuretum JRu- 
brum* " Bismuthum album" is a very objectionable name, 
especially as "Bismuthum" is recognised as the name of the 
metal itself. Under the doubt which was probably felt, as to 
the proper designation for this substance, now first introduced 
into the Ed. Pharmacopoeia, it would have been judicious to 
adopt the name of the London Pharmacopoeia, and thus se- 
cure the advantage, so far as it goes, of uniformity of nomen- 
clature. Similar views should have induced the Edinburgh 
College to adopt the London name for Fowler's solution, 
Liquor Potassx JirsenitisA The name " Sublimatus corro- 
sivus," even as an arbitrary name, seems deficient in preci- 
sion, and requires the prefix Hydrargyri at least as much as 
the name of white precipitate, which is called by the Ed- 
inburgh College " Hydrargyri precipitatum album." If 
there are more than one " white precipitate," so also there 
are more than one "corrosive sublimate;" and the prefix, 
" Hydrargyri," is not less necessary to the one name than to 
the other. 
We have already mentioned that the recent edition of the 
Edinburgh Pharmacopoeia is the first that has been printed in 
the English language. This reform was half adopted, so to 
speak, in the first and second U. S. Pharmacopoeias, which 
were printed with Latin and English on opposite pages; and 
has been fully carried out in the third, recently published, 
in conformity with the example of the Edinburgh Pharma- 
copoeia. This change has very properly not been extended 
to the Latin nomenclature, which is preserved; but the de- 
tails of the several processes are given in English. As the 
various processes necessarily contain an enumeration of the 
different officinal substances and preparations which are essen- 
tial either as ingredients or agents, and as the names of these 
must be given in English, as well as the mere directions of 
*This was the name of the Ed. College, in their first revised edition, 
(1839.) 
fThis name was first adopted in the U.S. Pharmacopoeia of 1830, and 
in the London Pharmacopoeia of 1836. By a misprint, this solution was 
called " Liquor Potassae Arseniatis" in the U. S. Pharm. of 1820. 
