On impurities and mistakes / by T. Lauder Brunton.

  • Brunton, Thomas Lauder, Sir, 1844-1916.
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On impurities and mistakes / by T. Lauder Brunton. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    think that probably they are prepared by the aid of a copper basin and iron balls in somewhat the same way as grey powder, so that the calomel undergoes some oxidation with the formation of a trace of per- chloride and a trace of peroxide. I have made com- parative trials with pilules containing one-twentieth of a grain of pure calomel, and I have not been so- pleased with their action as with that of these com- mercial pilules. At the same time it would be better if one knew precisely what one was doing, and had pilules guaranteed to contain a definite dose of calo- mel with a definite dose, however small, of corrosive sublimate or mercuric oxide, or both. It was, I believe, the tendency of mercury to pass into the mercuric condition by prolonged trituration that led Hahnemann into one of his errors, and to attribute the increased power of the drug to some occult dyna- misation instead of to definite chemical change. It is quite true that we do not know the intimate nature of this chemical change, and we cannot say whether mercury in its mercurous and mercuric state should be regarded as really two elements which, though con- vertible into one another, are distinct from each other, just as heat and mechanical energy are quite distinct, though convertible into each other. But we do know the conditions under which the mercurous will become converted into mercuric preparations, and we can regulate definitely the amount of conversion, and thus ascertain precisely what we are giving to our patients. There is another metal, viz., bismuth, whose im- purities, if not dangerous, are excessively disagreeable ; and my attention has been very forcibly attracted to it lately by the circumstance that the out-patient room at St. Bartholomew’s was smelling like an onion bed. This impurity is tellurium, and although this