Volume 1

Cooley's Cyclopædia of practical receipts and collateral information in the arts, manufactures, professions, and trades, including medicine, pharmacy, and domestic economy : designed as a comprehensive supplement to the pharmacopœia and general book of reference for the manufacturer, tradesman, amateur, and heads of families.

  • Cooley, Arnold J. (Arnold James)
Date:
1892
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Cooley's Cyclopædia of practical receipts and collateral information in the arts, manufactures, professions, and trades, including medicine, pharmacy, and domestic economy : designed as a comprehensive supplement to the pharmacopœia and general book of reference for the manufacturer, tradesman, amateur, and heads of families. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ABSTERGENTS— ACARI 0 chiefly depends on its capacity for imbibing mois- ture, and may be illustrated by the difference be- tween recent and disintegrated lava. {Leslie.) The finely divided state, most penetrable by the delicate fibres of plants, appears to derive its superior power of acting on atmospheric vapour from the augmentation of its surface and the multiplication of its points of contact, (lire.) This method of increasing the fertility of a soil is well known to scientific farmers, and seldom neglected by them. (Loudon.) That soil must be regarded as the most fertile which possesses this power in the greatest degree. Garden-mould has the highest absorbent power of any mineral substance. (Leslie.) Method of determining the absoebing powee OF A soil. Take a known weight of the soil, carefully sampled (about 1 oz.), spread it on paper, and expose it to the air of a dry room till it ceases to lose weight; the difference indicates water lost by evaporation. Place the sample thus air dried in a small beaker, and heat in an oil bath to 150° —160° C. (300°—350° Fahr.) until it ceases to lose weight—observe the amount of loss. Now expose the soil so dried to the air on a sheet of paper for twenty-four hours—weigh again. The gain in weight is due to water absorbed; if this amount to 1 part in 50 of soil it is so far an indi- cation of great agricultural capability. (Sutton.) See under Soils. Absorption. In chemistry, the passage of gases and vapours into liquid and solid substances. Thus, water absorbs the oxygen of the air, lime absorbs water, charcoal absorbs ammoniacal and other gases. Absorption. In medicine and toxicology, see Medicines and Poisons. Absorption. In perfumery, see Enfleiteage. Absorption. In physics, see Heat, Light, Refbigeeation, &c. Absorption. In physiology (animal and vege- table) the function of sucking, or taking up, of appropriate substances, by the ' absorbent vessels.' It is one of the chief vital functions, the primary object of which is to convey to the circulatory organs the proper supply of the materials neces- sary for the support and growth of the body; and subsequently, to remove and convey to these organs its effete and. useless portions, in order to their ultimate elimination from the system. Absorption. In surgery, the natural process by which tumours and their contents, morbid growths, and, sometimes, even healthy glands, &c, are gradually taken up and disappear, by the action of the ' absorbents.' Absorption (of Surfaces, Moulds, &c). See Absobbent Sttefaces. ABSTERGENTS. See Deteegents. ABSTRACTS. Absteacta, L. Solid powdered preparations, containing the soluble constituents of the drugs from which they are made; and bearing a definite and uniform relation to the drug from which they are made. They are pre- pared by evaporating a tincture of the drug at a low temperature, mixing with dry sugar of milk, so as to make the final product when dry weigh half the weight of the drug. They were first in- troduced into the United States Pharmacopoeia of 1880. ACAJOU NUT. Syn. Cashew nut. The fruit of Anacardium occidentale, a native of the West Indies, is kidney shaped, about an inch in length, and has a double shell. The kernel is oily, and is used as a common article of food in the tropics. ACANTH'OCEPHALA. The second natural order into which the Nemathelminthes or round worms are divided. Parasitic worms, represented by the large thorn-headed worm (Echinorhynchus gigas), occasionally found in the pig in England, common in France and Germany, and also in some parts of the United States. The male is generally about four inches in length, the female fifteen to twenty-four inches. This worm perforates the intestines of the hog, causing serious lesions, and ultimately death. According to Schneider, the eggs are discharged in the dung of the pig, eaten by maggots, in whose intestines the worm is developed; the mag- gots are eaten by the pigs, and the Echinorhyn- chus again reaches sexual maturity, and produces ova. See Woems and Paeasites. ACARI (-ri). [L.; prim. Gr.] Syn. Acab'i- DANS; Acab'ides (dez) ; ACAEiD'm (-e=e). In entomology, a division of Arachnidans, including the mite and tick. All the species are either mi- croscopic or extremely minute, and possess such tenacity of life as to resist for some time the ac- tion of boiling water, and to live with comparative impunity in alcohol. Leuwenhoek had one that lived eleven weeks glued on its back to the point of a needle without food. The following are well known—acaeus atjtumna'lis, the harvest-bug or loheal-ivorm; a. domes'tictts, the domestic tick; a. dysente'ei.^, the dysentery-tick; a. faei'n^:, the meal-mite (fig. a); a. eiclnus Magnified 250 diams,