University of Virginia Library

V.—CHEMISTRY AND MATERIA MEDICA.

Professor Emmet.—There are two classes in this school; one of
Chemistry, to which there are lectures given twice a week, and the
other of Materia Medica and Pharmacy, to which is given a lecture
once a week throughout the session.

In the Chemical lectures, all the important applications of the science
to the mechanic arts, agriculture and domestic economy are noticed,


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and, when practicable, illustrated by experiment. In the lectures
on earths and metals, the appropriate minerals are exhibited and
noticed with reference to the sciences of Mineralogy and Geology.
At the close of the history of inorganic matter, the atomic theory and
the laws of definite proportions are fully explained and exemplified.
The latter part of the course is occupied with the chemistry of organic
substances, and it comprises the history, analysis and properties of each
substance; to which are added general views of the connexion between
Chemistry and the physiology of animals and vegetables.

In the lectures on Materia Medica and Pharmacy, the subjects are
treated in the following order:—The operations of Pharmacy, Pharmaceutical
preparations, the effect which the combining of different
substances has on their medicinal properties, the different classifications
of the Materia Medica, and lastly, its several articles treated alphabetically.

There is attached to this school, a very extensive apparatus and a
laboratory, in which the students are occasionally permitted to see the
operations, and to perform experiments. A free use is made of the
black-board in these as in almost all the other classes in the University.