1 vm
2 In the trituration or pounding of medicines, metallic
3 vessels never should be used, as they not unfrequently
4 impart their properties to the drugs, changing their
5 colors, &c. Hard-stone, glass, or china mortars, are the
6 best. The spatula or spoon used to clear the pestle and
7 remove the powder which may adhere to the mortar,
8 must not be metallic, but ivory or bone.
9 The following three Recipes may suffice as specimens
10 of the three different modes of preparation :
11 1. Take of washed and dried Turkey fig-seeds, from 1 to 5
12 grains; white sugar, 15 grains; starch-pulp sufficient
13 to make a paste : begin by putting the fig-seeds into the
14 mortar, moistening them with drops of proof-spirit,
15 crushing them into a mass; add the sugar, in small
16 quantities, during trituration, reducing the whole to an
17 impalpable powder; then, add starch-pulp, sufficient to
18 make a paste, from which 25 lozenges are to be made.
19 All medicines of the first class to be prepared in a
20 similar manner.
21 2. Take of finely cut fulminating cotton, from 1 to 2 grains;
22 white sugar, 40 grains ; starch-pulp sufficient to make a
23 paste : from which mass 50 lozenges are to be made.
24 All medicines of the second class to be prepared in a
25 similar manner.
26 3. Take of fulminating silver, from 1 to 2 grains ; white sugar,
27 80 grains; starch-pulp sufficient to make a paste: from
28 which mass 100 lozenges are to be made.
29 All medicines of the third class to be prepared in a
30 similar manner.
31 N.B. — To avoid accidents from the explosion of fulminating metals, they must
32 be carefully managed, prepared in small quantities, and kept moist with spirit.
33 The sugar to be in a pulverized state when added, and before proceeding to
34 trituration, it must be thoroughly mixed, by the ivory spoon or spatula.