EDITOR'S TABLE.

Any book reviewed in this Department may be obtained upon receipt of price at the office of the DRUGGIST.

QUIZ DEPARTMENT.

Read This Before You Ask a Question.

Many questions are thrown in the waste basket each month on account of the correspondents failing to give name and address. The editor has a large basket for such questions. Write questions on separate sheets and on but one side of the paper. No questions will be answered by mail. Spell out in full every word; never abbreviate the names of medicines.

The International Medical Annual for 1898 will soon be ready for distribution. As many of our readers know it is published by E. B. Treat & Co., of New York City, and is a volume very appropriate for the use of pharmacists who desire to remember their phy-related to the Latin cortex. sicians with useful presents.

Massachusetts Pharmaceutical Association proceedings for 1897. J. F. GUERIN, Worcester, Secretary. The members of this association are to be congratulated upon the neat appearance of the volume before us. It is in great contrast to the unsightly document issued a few years ago.

The St. Louis Training School for Nurses has issued its fourteenth annual report. It is an organization worthy of the hearty support of the public and the kind interest of the medical and pharmaceutical professions. Copies of the report and other information can be obtained by addressing Miss E. L. Warr, 1214 Dillon street.

The Pharmacist at Work, edited by William C. Alpers, of New York City, and published by the J. B. Lippincott Company, of Philadelphia, Pa., is a new candidate for pharmaceutical favor. The majority of text and reference books are largely alike either in language or idea. It is seldom we find a book for students that does not reflect much from other authors. The work before us is a well-marked exception, and the volume is in every way characteristic of its author. To review it would mean the review of Mr. Alpers. It is not expected to replace either text or reference books any more than the author would expect to replace Remington's or Caspari's Pharmacy in his store or in the hands of his apprentices. It is a recitation of actual occurrences in a busy pharmacist's every-day work and as such fills another place in our list of text books. We feel that it should find its way to every retail drug store and be at hand for every pharmacy student. The book retails for $1.50 and will bring many returns to the retail druggist who studies it.

WILLIAM C. ALPERS.

Suggestions. Never despise a suggestion. The most ignorant person in the world may have an idea that will benefit you in your business, if you will keep your ears open and listen. Absorb all the ideas you can-some day they may be useful.

Paul G. Schuh of Cairo is President of the I. Ph. A.

Sexual Disorders (37), by Taylor, is a $3.00 book.
Cork (38) comes from the Spanish corcho and is

Fluckiger, Grundrissder (39) Pharmakognosie 2. mit Berücksichlig ung technisch wichtiger Lflanzen bears Auflage is $2.25, unbound.

Caffein Phtalate (40) is a white amorphous solid, of soft, friable consistency; soluble in five parts of water, also in hot alcohol. Solutions have an acid reaction.

Colorado Board (41) examinations consist of written answers to questions in pharmacy, materia medica and chemistry, also the identification of drugs and a drill in practical work.

Preservative M. (42) is a compound used for the preservation of milk. We understand that the milk inspector of the City of Chicago expects to soon make a report of the character of the preparation.

Pavi's Solution (43) for estimating glocuse: 4.158 g. crystalized copper sulphate, 20.4 g. Rochelle salts and 20.4 g. caustic potash are dissolved in water; 300 ccs. ammonia water (sp. gr. 0.88) are added and the whole diluted to one litre. 10.0 ccs. of this solution represent 0.005 g. glocuse. When all the cupric salt has been reduced to cuprous, the solution is colorless. Compare Fehling's solution.

Naphtol (44) (B Naphtol) (Isonaphtol)—C,H,O. Resplendent crystalline scales of aromatic odor. Very sparingly soluble in cold water; more easily in hot water. Readily soluble in alcohol; also fatty oil. It is applied externally, similarly to tar, in skin diseases, either in the form of ointment of 3 to 25%, or in alcohol solution of the strength of 2 to 5%. Care should be observed not to confound it with naphthalin.

The Word Anasthetic (45) was coined by the late Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes. He evidently intended to restrict its meaning to agents which cause a loss of all sensation, including consciousness. It is, however, used in a more restricted sense, since we have the term local anasthetic applied to cocaine, which causes a loss of common sensation without the person being deprived of consciousness. See definitions in Whelpley's Therapeutic Terms.

Sulphoboric Acid (46).-The Pharm. Centr. says: "This acid is similar to sulphuric acid, but more safe to handle and slower in action. It is prepared as follows:-150 grammes sulphuric acid are stirred in very gradually with 150 grammes pure boric acid, and the paste set aside for two or three days. It is then powdered and slowly mixed with 450 grammes sulphuric acid. On heating the resulting milky solution till clear, the acid is then ready for use."

Guaiac wood.
Buckthorn bark.
Senna leaves..
Sassafras bark
Anise seed..
Glycerin.....

Alcohol.....

Water enough to make one gallon.

Ink Spots on Carpets (48).—M. Billen says that when the ink is freshly spilt to first take up as much as possible of the ink with a teaspoon, if in considerable quantity, or with a blotting-pad if not so plentiful, using the latter under either condition at the finish. Now pour cold sweet milk over the spot, and, after letting remain a moment, take up as before, repeating the process until the milk comes away only slightly stained with black. Finish by using cold water, into which some lemon juice has been strained. Finally, rinse with pure water and dry off with a soft cloth, rubbing the surface slightly as the water is absorbed. Old ink spcts may be removed by moistening a crystal of citric acid and rubbing the spot gently, repeat-night and morning. ing the operation until the spot vanishes.

Cutose (49) is a name applied to the substance which covers and protects the aerial organs of plants. It is closely allied to the fatty bodies and resembles them in composition and properties. It has been examined chemically and the following description given of it:

Cutose resists the action of energetic acids; it is insoluble in dilute alkalies; neutral solvents have no action upon it, but it is modified by oxidizing agents and boiling alkaline liquids. With nitric acid it yields at first resinous bodies, and afterward suberic acid. Alkalies, and even alkaline carbonates, at a boiling heat dissolve cutose, split it up and convert it into a kind of soap, soluble in water and insoluble both in excess of alkali and saline solutions. Baryta, strontia and lime effect the same decomposition. Under the influence of bases, cutose gives rise to two new fatty acids, the stereocutic and the oleocutic. The former acid differs from all known solid fatty acids. It is white, fusible at 76°, almost insoluble in cold alcohol and ethers, scarcely soluble in boiling alcohol. Its true solvents are benzol and glacial acetic acid. On boiling this acid with dilute alkalies we obtain gelatinous salts insoluble in water. These two acids, when once modified, acquire new properties, which approximate them much to the primitive cutose. They form a neutral substance, which on treatment with caustic alkalies experiences a kind of saponification.

Compound Extract of Sarsaparilla (50).—A correspondent says: "Will you kindly forward or print me a formula for making compound extract of sarsaparilla such as manufacturers put up for the retail drug trade? We have quite a large amount of coarselypowdered sarsaparilla and burdock, prickly ash, etc. Would like to get a formula for making it up, as we

4 av. ozs.

8 av. ozs. .20 fl. ozs. 30 fl. ozs.

Grind all the drugs to No. 20 powder. Mix the glycerin and alcohol with two quarts of water, macerate for twenty-four hours and percolate. When the liquid has ceased to drop, pour upon it hot water until a gallon altogether has been obtained. Iodide of potassium in the proportion of one ounce to th gallon, or sulphate of sodium four ounces to the gallon, may be added.

Directions. One to two teaspoonfuls to be taken

Sealing Wax (51) The Stationer and Bookseller says: "Rosin (the whitest that can be obtained), Venice turpentine and vermillion are the components. For black wax, lamblack is to be added; for blue wax, smalt; and for yellow, opiment. When sealing wax was more widely used than is the case at present, scented wax was an article frequently on sale at fancy stationers; but in this epoch of feverish impatience and hurry, although our Gallic neighbors may have their sealing wax code, we rarely go beyond the employment of black wax for announcements of a funeral and mortuary kind, and of red wax for business letters. On the whole it may be said of sealing wax as of quill pens-nine out of ten prefer a steel pen to a quill one, and about the same proportion prefer using a gummed envelope to the trouble of sealing a letter with wax.

Before the introduction of the penny post envelopes were rarely used, because extra postage was charged for every paper enclosed in another, and for years afterward a four-page quarto letter was folded so as to be self-contained. When envelopes were first sold they were not gummed, so sealing wax was used. When such letters went across the equator, mostly in sailing vessels, the wax used to run and stick all the letters together, especially when the ship 'got into the doldrums,' and sizzled becalmed near the equator for days at a stretch. It is quite within modern memory when postage stamps were first perforated. Before they had to be cut apart with scissors or a knife, or to be torn from the sheet, to the disadvantage of a clumsy operator. The little discs called 'wafers' seem to have gone right out of fashion."

Vanadium Alloys.-Moissan finds that in the electric furnace vanadium alloys readily with iron, copper and aluminum.

Mackenzie and a line of successors and disciples.

AMERICAN PHARMACEUTICAL ASSOCIATION. From Caspari and contemporary with him, were his

ORGANIZED 1852-)

The Official Badge. Price, $2.00.

I Expect to go to Baltimore for the A. Ph. A. meeting, August 29, as it is a delightful place.-[DAN T. WOOLRIDGE, Boonville, Mo.

Baltimore is the right place for a meeting of the American Pharmaceutical Association. We did not assist any in its selection, but we join heartily in its ratification. [Rocky Mountain Druggist.

The Metric System has been adopted as the official system of weights and measures for the American Pharmaceutical Association; in other words, those members contributing papers are requested in the future to use the metric system wherever weights and measures are mentioned. The same rule applies to committee reports. By this action the association is simply practicing what it has been preaching for almost half a century.

brother William, the Stehls, Hassencamp, Diffenbach, Sharp, the Dohmes, Brack, Mittnacht and the younger Casparis. Of these, Charles Caspari, Jr., is the general secretary of the American Pharmaceutical Association, an office to which he was elected at Asheville in 1894, and which he fills scarcely less acceptably than did his illustrious and honored predecessor. He is known in Baltimore best as "Professor Caspari," having since 1879 been professor of pharmacy and director of the Pharmaceutical Laboratory at the Maryland College of Pharmacy, the institution from which he graduated in 1869. He was born in Baltimore in 1850 and secured his preparatory education at the private school of Rev. Henry Scheib and at the literary department of the University of Maryland. Some of his early store experience was gained in his father's establishment and subsequently he served a term of six years with Messrs. Sharp & Dohme, who at that time conducted a very successful prescription business and had not yet entered upon the career of manufacturers. (Mr. A. P. Sharp had been for five or six years head clerk in the elder Caspari's store early in the 40's.) He continued the business left by his father, at 44 North Gay street, for several years and afterwards successfully conducted a pharmacy at corner of Baltimore and Fremont streets. In 1891 he

himself to teaching, scientific research and pharmaceutical writing. He is one of the editors of the National Dispensatory and his "Treatise on Pharmacy" is almost too well known, as a text and reference book, to need mentioning. He is a painstaking investigator and has done much to improve the formulas of both the Pharmacopoeia and National Formulary. Besides all this he finds time to help along the College and State Association work by serving effectively upon various important committees.

A Pleasing Feature of the A. Ph. A. meetings disposed of this business and since then has devoted wherever held, is the hearty good-fellowship, fraternal greeting and interchange of thoughts and opinions with both old and new acquaintances who are interested in the same line of work. Retail druggists, college teachers, Board of Pharmacy Examiners, State Association officers and journal editors all meet upon at least one common ground, that of fraternal relations. We believe that we are safe in saying that the members were never more thoroughly enthused with this mutual feeling of common interests and the cordial welcome of the local fraternity than was the case at Lake Minnetonka. The 1897 meeting stands quite prominently as one in which personal differences and selfish motives have been conspicuous by their absence in all of the private, public and formal discussions. May this ever be the case.

While it is true, as stated, he descends from a line of German pharmacists, Professor Caspari is quite broad enough to accept any teaching that is good and progressive. His power to elect is remarkable, and his well-filled storehouse of carefully gleaned facts finds ready application as occasion requires. His positive manner comes from positive knowledge; the professor is wholly right or he is entirely wrong, and so straightforward is he always that he at once wins one's respect for honesty of purpose. He lives largely in the world of pharmacy and pharmacists, and no one is looking forward to the coming of the A. Ph. A. with more pleasure than he, and no one will welcome its members more cordially to Baltimore, his home, than will our general secretary.

How to Kill Them.-Some bacteria thrive ten days in a solution of strychnine, a small dose of which would be fatal to man, but they can live only two hours in a solution of tannin, which could do us no more harm than to pucker our lips.

Clifton Terrace, Ill., June o to 8, 1898, I. Ph. A.