The Sun.
London, England, 1865-03-27 00:00:00

detection when mixed with others more powerful in
odour though more innocuous.
It is against such dangers that the new Bill to
regulate the qualifications of chemists and druggists
attempts to guard us, and if it becomes law we shall
certainly have a better chance of safety. Whether
all the provisions of the Bill will pass unchallenged,
whether professional jealousy may resent the promi-
nence given to the Pharmaceutical Society, or
whether some of its ends may be attained by simpler
or surer means remains to be discovers in the course
of its progress through Parliament, but the general
tenor and object of the measure must commend
themselves to the good sense of every important
critic. Its great principle is to prohibit any person
from carrying on the business of a chemist and
druggist, in the keeping of open shop for the com-
pounding of medical prescriptions unless on a
register, which register is also to include their adult
assistants. It would be difficult, if not impossible,
as the framers of the bill observe, to prohibit per-
sons from vending drugs or chemicals, or from their
admixture, since they are continually required for
purposes not medicinal, for departments of trade
and manufacture and chemical experiments. Such
legislation might well be resented as unduly ham-
pering the ordinary business of life, and, therefore,
the Bill restricts itself to the prohibition of the use
of the titles of Chemist and Druggist, and the keep-
ing of open shops for making up doctors' prescrip-
tions by unregistered persons. No law, it is urged,
prevents a man's neighbour from performing a
surgical operation, or administering drugs to him,
only the public are protected from ignorant practi-
tioners, by the license necessary for the appropria-
tion of the titles of Physician, Surgeon, Apothecary.
Persons can if theychoose consult unlicensed advisers,
and they continually do so to their cost ; but the
Medical Act provides that if they go to a man bear-
ing a recognised title they can insure a certain
amount of professional knowledge. At present there
is nothing to prevent any person from commencing
business as a chemist and druggist, be he ever so
ignorant of pharmacy : nay, he may undertake to
make up prescriptions with scarcely any knowledge
of Latin, and therefore it is not surprising that acci-
dents in the compounding of medicines, whether
from the substitution of one drug for another, or
from a mistake in the quantity, are of such fre-
quent occurrence. The Medical Council recently
passed a resolution which called the attention of
the Home Secretary to the present defective state
of the law, and expressed the opinion of the Coun-
cil that some legislative enactment was urgently
called for to protect the public from reckless incom-
petence. By the passing of this bill no hardship
would be inflicted on tradesmen already established
in business, since the fourth clause of the act pro-
vides that all persons now in such business shall be
placed on the register if they produce a certificate
from a duly qualified medical practitioner
stating that they have been in the habit of
compounding prescriptions. Their assistants
will also have the same advantage, and we are glad
to find that such assistants are specially mentioned
in the act, since accidents much more frequently
result from the carelessness or ignorance of these
youths than from the neglect of their masters. The
Registrar is to be bound to print and publish an ac-
curate report containing a correct register of all per-
sons entitled to carry on the business of chemists and
druggists, so that the means of proof will be simple
and easily obtained. Certain penalties are attached
to the falsification of the register, the obtaining of
registration by false pretences, or the keeping of an
open shop for dispensing prescriptions unless duly
qualified. By these means ignorance and presump-
tion will be guarded against, and if persons choose
to seek them out the risk of disaster lies at their own
doors. The bill has been framed by Sir FITZROY
KELLY, Mr. KINGLAKE, and Mr. STAFFORD NORTH-
COTE, whose names are a sufficient guarantee against
hasty or imperfect legislation. 'We hope, therefore,
that the House of Commons will give the measure
full and fair consideration, and we have little doubt,
considering its substantial merits and the social im-
portance of the question, that it will ultimately
become law.

Last Saturday an interesting ceremony took place
in the modern Athens. Two public statues were
inaugurated to the memory of departed worthies.
One was a colossal bronze figure of the late Pro-
fessor JOHN WILSON. It has &en subscribed for
by his friends and admirers and fellow-citizens. A
very impressive ceremony took place, alike worthy
of those whose memory it was sought to honour,
and of the city where it took place. The Lord
Justice-General made an admirable speech in pre-
senting the WILSON statue to the city, and thus
appropriately explained the feelings which actuated
those who erected it :—" The friends and admirers of
WILSON were many, his countrymen were proud of
him ;foreigners joined in the admiration of histalents;
his literary reputation extended through every
quarter of the globe; his high poetic genius, his lofty
sentiment, his critical acumen, his vast and varied
knowledge, his exalted patriotism, his powerful
talents and the manly and generous use he made of
them, his lively humour, and his kindly heart,
secured the warm esteem and attachment of all
who knew him well, and commanded the respect
and admiration of many who to him were strangers."
A more earnest and eloquent tribute could not have
been paid to the memory of the famed CHRISTOPHER
NORTH ; and the genial manner in which this ad-
dress was delivered rendered it a particularly fitting
epitaph for one who in his life was so renowned for
his gracious manners, and attracted so many byrhis
frank and friendly spirit. The Lord Justice-
General explained the object which they had in
wviieswheidn tthouseprereest a monument
entingthistat
to ueto the City;
for ages
they
s
by which the living
might honour the illustrious
dead. Edinburgh was, of course, the fitting spot
for the erection of such a memento, being the place
where the departed was best known, the city he
adorned by his genius, and the metropolis of the
country so proud to rank him
in
amopnrgeshenertindninh-e
guished sons. Sir J. M'NEILL,
statue of the poet ALLAN RAMSAY to the city,
observed that he had the interesting duty to per-
form of offering to their acceptance another memo-
rial of another citizen of Edinburgh, who had
departed this life a hundred years ago, but had left
behind him a name still familiar in every cottage in
Scotland, and still fresh in the hearts of his country-
men. An interesting feature of Saturday's proceed-
ings was appropriately alluded to by SirJ. M'NEILL,
and that was the circumstance of both these statues
being executed by the same artist, and that artist a
Scotchman. Hitherto when it has been sought to
erect statues to departed worthies of Scotland they
have been brought from beyond the border. Mr.
STEELL has, however, come forward to do honour
to himself in honouring others, and has gained
deserved reward by his assiduous efforts to repro-
duce the illustrious dead to adorn the cities where
their
Provost, m memories oriesare held in repute. The Lord
responding to the gifts, declared that
the inhabitants were grateful for the gifts which had
that day been bestowed upon them ; they added to
the decorations of the city, which wou'd soon rival
those of ancient times in works of art. No better
tribute can be desired by those who Ellin' e out con-
spicuous among their fellow-men, Bear sous of