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THE ADULTERATION OF DRUGS.
THE EXPENDITURE OF THE METROPOLITAN ASYLUMS BOARD. -
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1629
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I
of the viscera and their contents revealed the presence it seems to us that his latest exposition will be considered of a large quantity of strychnine. From the character- his masterpiece. Biassed undoubtedly he was, but in the istic symptoms and the chemical analysis there could justifiable sense to which the late Mr. JUSTICE MELLOR gave be no shadow of doubt that the deceased had died his judicial sanction when he said "if the evidence is strong from strychnine poisoning. The questions to be deter- the summing up should be strong." It would be wrong on ined were-Was the alkaloid taken by accident or was it the part of a judge simply to enumerate the facts which administered with a felonious intent ? and if the latter, who might be arrayed against a prisoner or presented in extenuathe guilty person?1 Although strict inquiries were made tion or disproof of his alleged guilt. His remarks should be one other than HORSFORD likely to be known to Mrs. directive and not merely descriptive. They should be of HOLMES and to be interested in her affairs was found to such nature and strength as will assist the jury in arriving have purchased strychnine from the chemists for some dis- at ajust conclusion. tance around. Fortunately there was no difficulty in comwas
paring HoRSFORD’s known handwriting with the direction on the packet containing the powder. The likeness between the two was so striking that it scarcely needed an expert to appreciate it. Now, whether HORSFORD caused to be administered the poison with the intent to procure abortion-a proposition purely visionary-or to compass death mattered not. The post-mortem examination showed that Mrs. HoLMES had not been pregnant within a short period of her death. Bat even this mistake as
Annotations. II Be
quid nimiii."
THE EXPENDITURE OF THE METROPOLITAN THE expenditure of the Metropolitan Asylums Board and the inattention of the public to it have long been the surprise of those who take any interest in such matters. Those who are keen to replace our voluntary hospital system by a State-supported one should immediately begin their study of the working of this Board. The technical nature of the questions in architecture involved and their remoteness from the burning contests of politics, and a vague impression that everybody is benefited all round by the hospitals, in part account for the general apathy with which their administration is regarded. It is at least satisfactory to see indications that the Local Government Board is uneasy on the subject and keeps up its demand for more specific information. At the meeting on Saturday last a letter from the Local Government Board was read stating that the report of the Special Committee on the Brook Hospital expenditure did not give specific replies to the letter of the Local Government Board of Oct. 22nd ; that the special committee did not employ a competent surveyor as suggested by them and as ordered by the managers; and. that they were still of opinion that such a course should be adopted. It is also satisfactory to find that some members of the Board are alive to the seriousness of the facts. Mr. F. Purchese is reported in the Times of the 6th inst. to have characterised the construction of the hospital as a gross scandal, the cost exceeding the architect’s estimate by .670. OCO, about .E38.000 being for work authorised by the architect without the consent of the committee or of the Board. He moved for a special inquiry by the Local Government Board. It was finally decided to forward the report of the Special Committee, and a letter answering the questions raised and promising help to the Local Government Board in any further inquiries. We hope the Government will spare time from its larger cares to pay some attention to this question and the various bearings of it. The whole subject of the administration of the hospitals and their effect on the limitation of disease is one of immense public importance.
to her condition would not have diminished the criminal
Tesponsibility, since the Act in considering the penalties for the procuring of abortion distinctly says "whether
the woman be pregnant or not." The chief contentions for the defence were (1) that some other person than HORSFORD might have been the guilty party; (2) that thei strychnine found in the papers might have been put unde the bed subsequently to the death of Mrs. HOLMES; andl (3) that it was not likely that HORSFORD,"who only valued Mrs. HoLMES’s body at half a crown"-a sum he acknowledged to have given her-would sacrifice her bodyr and soul at the risk of losing his own life. As regardsI the first, it may be remarked that there was not the slightest testimony that any other person than HORSFORD) had any reason for taking her life. The other points are3 too puerile to merit discussion. Touching the adequacy of motive we submit that the! history of murders committed of malice aforethought shows3 that from an ordinary standpoint the prime cause is seldom1 commensurate with the deed-in fact, it is more often than1 not so utterly disproportionate that some ethical writers have questioned whether the act is not the final result off a state of mind that is hovering on, or that has passed1 beyond, the frontier of sanity. And, again, there is the pro. pensity to trust in the chances which may favour the failure&bgr; of detection of the crime. Since the time of PALMBB no) case of murder by strychnine poisoning so foul in every sense&bgr; of the word has been brought to light as that now underr consideration. United to his victim by ties of blood, in debtt to her morally for the wrong he had done to her, HORSFORDa hesitated not to treacherously take the life of a lonely widowy and make her innocent children orphans, and all for the THE ADULTERATION OF DRUGS. miserable gain of freedom from the consequences of his IN the matter of adulteration the subject of food is lust. The links in the chain, or rather the strands in the! rope, of evidence were so convincing, so natural in their generally uppermost in the mind and of recent years the connexion and cohesion that none but the wilfully blind interest taken in suppressing fraud in this direction has been so as to have resulted at last in an organised could for a moment hesitate to endorse the verdict. The very keen, movement urging upon the present Government the necessity compliment and thanks rendered by the jury to the presiding; of providing more effective measures. All this time the judge might be deemed tiupeifluous, but facile princeps as ifI question of the sophistication of drugs is to a large extent Mr. JUSTICE HAWKINS in directing juries in criminal triah! likely to be lost bight of. Indeed, it has been proposed ’
>
,
.
,
.
1630
.
to entitle the new Act simply the Adulteration Act, apparently without reference to drugs at all. The matter of keeping vigorously maintained a system of control in drugs is certainly next in importance to that of a similar control over food ; it obviously directly concerns the public and, it need hardly be added, the medical adviser. Yet judging from the Government returns the ratio of drugs examined to food is most insignificant and not in accordance with public and professional requirements. In the last Local Government Board return (1896-1897) out of a total of 45,555 samples taken for analysis only 1380 specimens (about one-fortieth part of the total number) of drugs were taken, the extent of adulteration amounting to 11 3 per cent., against 9-2 per cent. in the case of food. It invariably happens when the authorities become active that offences are proved. Such was the case in Sunderland a few weeks ago, when several druggists were convicted for selling drugs of inferior quality. In Gregory’s powder carbonate of magnesia had been used instead of oxide and
of the International Sanitary Commission without modifying them and adhere to the sanitary conferences of Paris and Venice; (2) to cause a meeting of a commission in order tOo decide how to put into execution the decisions of said sanitary conferences and decide upon the necessary steps to, be taken for the protection of Turkey and Europe against the plague; and (3) at last to insist upon the adoption by the Ottoman Government of an efficient system of hygiene" and sanitary improvements of all the cities of the empire. We fear that to compel the Turkish Government to do such things as are included in the third heading, which would involve an immense expenditure of money from Constantinople to the Persian Gulf, is rather a hopeless task.
OBSTETRICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON: DENTIAL ADDRESS
PRESI-
Wn have received the annual presidential address which delivered before this society in February last and which has now been printed in separate form. As a rule in one case calcium carbonate. In another instance the the of these addresses is largely restricted to, appreciation powder consisted of two-thirds of sulphate of lime. those who to be present on the particular evening happen Again, precipitated sulphur was shown to have contained when are delivered, for the volume of the society’sthey a percentage of sulphate of lime, due probably to careless preparation; and, lastly, a druggist had supplied sub- Transactions in which the address appears does not come out till about a year afterwards, by which limated instead of precipitated sulphur. The proceedings generally much time of the interest, which is necessarily partly of an in regard to drugs, unlike those in regard to the adulterahas evaporated. This is certainly to be character, tion of food, are instituted upon a much more definite and ephemeral in as the present instance, so much care when, satisfactory line, since, of course, the British Pharmaco- regretted been taken in has the preparation of the address. It conpeela lays down the kind and strength of the preparations tains a of the present condition of the statement especially sold. It is in a similar direction that new legislation is which we are to glad see is one of vigorous activity required in regard to food-that there may be definite society, a review of the work done in the past and prosperity ; standards fixed and more precise titular definitions of various and of the life and labours of those an account articles of food. And in regard to drugs a greater pro- session ; of who have been removed by death Fellows the society portion of samples than 3 per cent. should be taken under observe that the alterations made We the provisions of the Food and Drugs Act by the authorities during the year. if a satisfactory standard of purity and quality is to be in the form of the certificate granted to midwives after examination by the society has not had the maintained. effect of diminishing the number of candidates, but. that, so far from this being the case, the number MEASURES FOR PROTECTING TURKEY AND is increasing. Dr. Cullingworth defines the position of EUROPE AGAINST PLAGUE. the society in this matter as follows. He says:"It must DR. ZAVITZIANO, United States Sanitary Commissioner at be clearly understood that the society undertook the work Constantinople, reports to his Government that, in spite of merely as a temporary expedient and from a sense o the steps of the International Sanitary Commission, there are public duty after having tried in vain to induce the Governmany questions which render such steps delusive. He ment to move in the matter, and that it will only be too glad to relinquish it whenever the State can be prevailed upon instances the condition of the sanitary defence of Bassorah. "I reported," he says, " the arrival on the 10th inst. of the to take upon itself functions that properly belong to it and Steamship Patna from Bombay with 125 passengers. During ;hat it alone can adequately fulfil." It is interesting to the journey from Bombay to Karachi bubonic plague made observe that the papers read at the society’s meeting? its appearance on board. It was a fireman who fell ill aat session were equally divided between midwifery and and was landed at Karachi. A second case occurred off gynaecology—subjects naturally allied, which cannot withBushi and a third at Bassorah. I have already written mt disadvantage be studied, or indeed practised, sepain my previous reports how much Turkey is exposed to the invasion of epidemics through the Persian ately. To our thinking, it is the biographical portion of Gulf and that the different members of the Inter- he address which especially taxes the industry and, we national Sanitary Commission expressed on the contrary nay add, the tact of the writer ; he has to deal with their opinion, which is quite different, and according to he history of the lives of men who have been for the most which no epidemic ever entered Turkey from that way." )art his contemporaries, who have been engaged in the same has been the cholera It epidemic tind of work as himself, who have necessarily sometimes frequently stated that only in 1882 entered through Bassorah and probably that of bought as he does and at other times perhaps held 1888-9. Ex post facto, now that a case of bubonic plague pinions largely at variance with his own. Dr. Cullingworth exists already in the would-be lazaretto of Bassorah, it lad to deal with four names of the first importance-viz., has been decided that any ship arriving at Bassorah and iir Spencer Wells, Dr. Lusk, Dr. Braxton Hicks, and Professor having on board cases of bubonic plague will be turned back ’arnier. We think his somewhat delicate task in writing a after the mail has been landed. The foreign sanitary repre- iographical sketch of each of these eminent men has been sentatives, seeing that in spite of the orders given by the dmirably performed. Dr. Cullingworth has not restricted sanitary authority the danger of the spread of the epidemic is imself to merely describing the comparatively uninteresting always imminent, have decided (1) to present to the ambas- Mts of birthplace, parentage, and the like in each case, but sadors or ministers whom they represent at the International as given some account of the principal work done by each Sanitary Commission a memorial according to which diplo- f them. Probably the sketch of the life of Professor Tarnier I the one which contains most that is not generally matic action would be taken in order to compel the Ottoman Gnernment to respect and put into execution the decisions amillar. The woik he did in adopting measures at the was
---
-----
1629
----------
I
of the viscera and their contents revealed the presence it seems to us that his latest exposition will be considered of a large quantity of strychnine. From the character- his masterpiece. Biassed undoubtedly he was, but in the istic symptoms and the chemical analysis there could justifiable sense to which the late Mr. JUSTICE MELLOR gave be no shadow of doubt that the deceased had died his judicial sanction when he said "if the evidence is strong from strychnine poisoning. The questions to be deter- the summing up should be strong." It would be wrong on ined were-Was the alkaloid taken by accident or was it the part of a judge simply to enumerate the facts which administered with a felonious intent ? and if the latter, who might be arrayed against a prisoner or presented in extenuathe guilty person?1 Although strict inquiries were made tion or disproof of his alleged guilt. His remarks should be one other than HORSFORD likely to be known to Mrs. directive and not merely descriptive. They should be of HOLMES and to be interested in her affairs was found to such nature and strength as will assist the jury in arriving have purchased strychnine from the chemists for some dis- at ajust conclusion. tance around. Fortunately there was no difficulty in comwas
paring HoRSFORD’s known handwriting with the direction on the packet containing the powder. The likeness between the two was so striking that it scarcely needed an expert to appreciate it. Now, whether HORSFORD caused to be administered the poison with the intent to procure abortion-a proposition purely visionary-or to compass death mattered not. The post-mortem examination showed that Mrs. HoLMES had not been pregnant within a short period of her death. Bat even this mistake as
Annotations. II Be
quid nimiii."
THE EXPENDITURE OF THE METROPOLITAN THE expenditure of the Metropolitan Asylums Board and the inattention of the public to it have long been the surprise of those who take any interest in such matters. Those who are keen to replace our voluntary hospital system by a State-supported one should immediately begin their study of the working of this Board. The technical nature of the questions in architecture involved and their remoteness from the burning contests of politics, and a vague impression that everybody is benefited all round by the hospitals, in part account for the general apathy with which their administration is regarded. It is at least satisfactory to see indications that the Local Government Board is uneasy on the subject and keeps up its demand for more specific information. At the meeting on Saturday last a letter from the Local Government Board was read stating that the report of the Special Committee on the Brook Hospital expenditure did not give specific replies to the letter of the Local Government Board of Oct. 22nd ; that the special committee did not employ a competent surveyor as suggested by them and as ordered by the managers; and. that they were still of opinion that such a course should be adopted. It is also satisfactory to find that some members of the Board are alive to the seriousness of the facts. Mr. F. Purchese is reported in the Times of the 6th inst. to have characterised the construction of the hospital as a gross scandal, the cost exceeding the architect’s estimate by .670. OCO, about .E38.000 being for work authorised by the architect without the consent of the committee or of the Board. He moved for a special inquiry by the Local Government Board. It was finally decided to forward the report of the Special Committee, and a letter answering the questions raised and promising help to the Local Government Board in any further inquiries. We hope the Government will spare time from its larger cares to pay some attention to this question and the various bearings of it. The whole subject of the administration of the hospitals and their effect on the limitation of disease is one of immense public importance.
to her condition would not have diminished the criminal
Tesponsibility, since the Act in considering the penalties for the procuring of abortion distinctly says "whether
the woman be pregnant or not." The chief contentions for the defence were (1) that some other person than HORSFORD might have been the guilty party; (2) that thei strychnine found in the papers might have been put unde the bed subsequently to the death of Mrs. HOLMES; andl (3) that it was not likely that HORSFORD,"who only valued Mrs. HoLMES’s body at half a crown"-a sum he acknowledged to have given her-would sacrifice her bodyr and soul at the risk of losing his own life. As regardsI the first, it may be remarked that there was not the slightest testimony that any other person than HORSFORD) had any reason for taking her life. The other points are3 too puerile to merit discussion. Touching the adequacy of motive we submit that the! history of murders committed of malice aforethought shows3 that from an ordinary standpoint the prime cause is seldom1 commensurate with the deed-in fact, it is more often than1 not so utterly disproportionate that some ethical writers have questioned whether the act is not the final result off a state of mind that is hovering on, or that has passed1 beyond, the frontier of sanity. And, again, there is the pro. pensity to trust in the chances which may favour the failure&bgr; of detection of the crime. Since the time of PALMBB no) case of murder by strychnine poisoning so foul in every sense&bgr; of the word has been brought to light as that now underr consideration. United to his victim by ties of blood, in debtt to her morally for the wrong he had done to her, HORSFORDa hesitated not to treacherously take the life of a lonely widowy and make her innocent children orphans, and all for the THE ADULTERATION OF DRUGS. miserable gain of freedom from the consequences of his IN the matter of adulteration the subject of food is lust. The links in the chain, or rather the strands in the! rope, of evidence were so convincing, so natural in their generally uppermost in the mind and of recent years the connexion and cohesion that none but the wilfully blind interest taken in suppressing fraud in this direction has been so as to have resulted at last in an organised could for a moment hesitate to endorse the verdict. The very keen, movement urging upon the present Government the necessity compliment and thanks rendered by the jury to the presiding; of providing more effective measures. All this time the judge might be deemed tiupeifluous, but facile princeps as ifI question of the sophistication of drugs is to a large extent Mr. JUSTICE HAWKINS in directing juries in criminal triah! likely to be lost bight of. Indeed, it has been proposed ’
>
,
.
,
.
1630
.
to entitle the new Act simply the Adulteration Act, apparently without reference to drugs at all. The matter of keeping vigorously maintained a system of control in drugs is certainly next in importance to that of a similar control over food ; it obviously directly concerns the public and, it need hardly be added, the medical adviser. Yet judging from the Government returns the ratio of drugs examined to food is most insignificant and not in accordance with public and professional requirements. In the last Local Government Board return (1896-1897) out of a total of 45,555 samples taken for analysis only 1380 specimens (about one-fortieth part of the total number) of drugs were taken, the extent of adulteration amounting to 11 3 per cent., against 9-2 per cent. in the case of food. It invariably happens when the authorities become active that offences are proved. Such was the case in Sunderland a few weeks ago, when several druggists were convicted for selling drugs of inferior quality. In Gregory’s powder carbonate of magnesia had been used instead of oxide and
of the International Sanitary Commission without modifying them and adhere to the sanitary conferences of Paris and Venice; (2) to cause a meeting of a commission in order tOo decide how to put into execution the decisions of said sanitary conferences and decide upon the necessary steps to, be taken for the protection of Turkey and Europe against the plague; and (3) at last to insist upon the adoption by the Ottoman Government of an efficient system of hygiene" and sanitary improvements of all the cities of the empire. We fear that to compel the Turkish Government to do such things as are included in the third heading, which would involve an immense expenditure of money from Constantinople to the Persian Gulf, is rather a hopeless task.
OBSTETRICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON: DENTIAL ADDRESS
PRESI-
Wn have received the annual presidential address which delivered before this society in February last and which has now been printed in separate form. As a rule in one case calcium carbonate. In another instance the the of these addresses is largely restricted to, appreciation powder consisted of two-thirds of sulphate of lime. those who to be present on the particular evening happen Again, precipitated sulphur was shown to have contained when are delivered, for the volume of the society’sthey a percentage of sulphate of lime, due probably to careless preparation; and, lastly, a druggist had supplied sub- Transactions in which the address appears does not come out till about a year afterwards, by which limated instead of precipitated sulphur. The proceedings generally much time of the interest, which is necessarily partly of an in regard to drugs, unlike those in regard to the adulterahas evaporated. This is certainly to be character, tion of food, are instituted upon a much more definite and ephemeral in as the present instance, so much care when, satisfactory line, since, of course, the British Pharmaco- regretted been taken in has the preparation of the address. It conpeela lays down the kind and strength of the preparations tains a of the present condition of the statement especially sold. It is in a similar direction that new legislation is which we are to glad see is one of vigorous activity required in regard to food-that there may be definite society, a review of the work done in the past and prosperity ; standards fixed and more precise titular definitions of various and of the life and labours of those an account articles of food. And in regard to drugs a greater pro- session ; of who have been removed by death Fellows the society portion of samples than 3 per cent. should be taken under observe that the alterations made We the provisions of the Food and Drugs Act by the authorities during the year. if a satisfactory standard of purity and quality is to be in the form of the certificate granted to midwives after examination by the society has not had the maintained. effect of diminishing the number of candidates, but. that, so far from this being the case, the number MEASURES FOR PROTECTING TURKEY AND is increasing. Dr. Cullingworth defines the position of EUROPE AGAINST PLAGUE. the society in this matter as follows. He says:"It must DR. ZAVITZIANO, United States Sanitary Commissioner at be clearly understood that the society undertook the work Constantinople, reports to his Government that, in spite of merely as a temporary expedient and from a sense o the steps of the International Sanitary Commission, there are public duty after having tried in vain to induce the Governmany questions which render such steps delusive. He ment to move in the matter, and that it will only be too glad to relinquish it whenever the State can be prevailed upon instances the condition of the sanitary defence of Bassorah. "I reported," he says, " the arrival on the 10th inst. of the to take upon itself functions that properly belong to it and Steamship Patna from Bombay with 125 passengers. During ;hat it alone can adequately fulfil." It is interesting to the journey from Bombay to Karachi bubonic plague made observe that the papers read at the society’s meeting? its appearance on board. It was a fireman who fell ill aat session were equally divided between midwifery and and was landed at Karachi. A second case occurred off gynaecology—subjects naturally allied, which cannot withBushi and a third at Bassorah. I have already written mt disadvantage be studied, or indeed practised, sepain my previous reports how much Turkey is exposed to the invasion of epidemics through the Persian ately. To our thinking, it is the biographical portion of Gulf and that the different members of the Inter- he address which especially taxes the industry and, we national Sanitary Commission expressed on the contrary nay add, the tact of the writer ; he has to deal with their opinion, which is quite different, and according to he history of the lives of men who have been for the most which no epidemic ever entered Turkey from that way." )art his contemporaries, who have been engaged in the same has been the cholera It epidemic tind of work as himself, who have necessarily sometimes frequently stated that only in 1882 entered through Bassorah and probably that of bought as he does and at other times perhaps held 1888-9. Ex post facto, now that a case of bubonic plague pinions largely at variance with his own. Dr. Cullingworth exists already in the would-be lazaretto of Bassorah, it lad to deal with four names of the first importance-viz., has been decided that any ship arriving at Bassorah and iir Spencer Wells, Dr. Lusk, Dr. Braxton Hicks, and Professor having on board cases of bubonic plague will be turned back ’arnier. We think his somewhat delicate task in writing a after the mail has been landed. The foreign sanitary repre- iographical sketch of each of these eminent men has been sentatives, seeing that in spite of the orders given by the dmirably performed. Dr. Cullingworth has not restricted sanitary authority the danger of the spread of the epidemic is imself to merely describing the comparatively uninteresting always imminent, have decided (1) to present to the ambas- Mts of birthplace, parentage, and the like in each case, but sadors or ministers whom they represent at the International as given some account of the principal work done by each Sanitary Commission a memorial according to which diplo- f them. Probably the sketch of the life of Professor Tarnier I the one which contains most that is not generally matic action would be taken in order to compel the Ottoman Gnernment to respect and put into execution the decisions amillar. The woik he did in adopting measures at the was