A curious controversy prevailed for a long time among the chemical and medical authorities in France in regard to a popular proprietary remedy for syphilis known as Rob Boyveau-Laffecteur. It was sold as a non-mercurial compound. It was first prepared or advertised in 1780 by a war office official named Laffecteur, whose position enabled him to get it largely used in the army. Subsequently a Paris doctor named Boyveau bought a share in the business, but in time the partners separated, and both sold the Rob. Boyveau wrote a bulky volume on the treatment of syphilis, and in that he strongly praised the Rob. After the deaths of Laffecteur and Boyveau the business came into the hands of a Dr. Giraudeau, of St. Gervais. This was about the year 1829. In 1780 the Academie de Medicine had examined this preparation, and had apparently, though not formally, tolerated its sale. Their chemist, Bucquet, had been instructed specially to examine the syrup for sublimate. He reported that he could not find any, but he was by no means sure that there was none there, for he stated that he had himself added 2 grains to a bottle, and could not afterwards detect its presence. Between that time and 1829 several chemists studied the subject, and came to the conclusion that if corrosive sublimate had been added to the syrup the vegetable extractive or the molasses with which it was made so concealed it or decomposed it into calomel that it could not be detected. In 1829 Giraudeau was prosecuted for selling secret medicines, and for this offence was fined 600 francs. But the interesting feature of this trial was the testimony of Pelletier, Chevallier, and Orfila that the Rob contained no mercurial. They reported that the formula given by the maker might be the correct one, but that in that case the mixture would contain too small a quantity of active substances to possess the energetic properties claimed for it. Guaiacum and sarsaparilla were the principal ingredients, but there were also lobelia, astragalus root, several other herbs, and a little opium. The history of this discussion is related at some length in Dr. Michelon’s “Histoire Pharmacotechnique et Pharmacologique du Mercure” (1908).
Red Precipitate.
Red precipitate was one of the first preparations of mercury known. It is traced to Geber, but when the works attributed to that chemist were written is doubtful. Avicenna in the tenth century was acquainted with it. In his writings he says of the metal mercury that “warmed in a closed vessel it loses its humidity, that is to say its liquid state, and is changed into the nature of fire and becomes vermilion.” Being obtained direct from mercury acted on by the air, it became known to the early chemical experimenters as “precipitatus per se.” Paracelsus obtained it by acting on mercury with aqua regia and heating the solution until he got the red precipitate. Then he reduced it to the necessary mildness for medicinal purposes by distilling spirit of wine from it six or seven times. Charas described a method of obtaining the precipitate by nitric acid but by a complicated process, and to the product he gave the name of arcana corallina. Boyle obtained the red oxide by boiling mercury in a bottle fitted with a stopper which was provided with a narrow tube by which air was admitted. The product was called Boyle’s Hell, because it was believed that it caused the metal to suffer extreme agonies.
Other Mercurial Precipitates.
The multitude of experiments with mercury yielded many products, and often the same product by a different process which acquired a distinct name.
Turbith mineral was a secret preparation with Oswald Crollius who gave it this name, probably, it is supposed, on account of its resemblance in colour to the Turbethum (Convolvulus) roots which were in his time much used in medicine. It is a subsulphate, made by treating mercury with oil of vitriol and precipitating with water.
The precipitation of mercury by sal ammoniac was first described by Beguin in 1632. For a time it was given as a purgative and in venereal diseases. A double chloride of mercury and ammonium was also made by the alchemists and was highly esteemed by them, especially as it was soluble. It was called Sal Alembroth and also Sal Sapientiæ. The origin of the first name is unknown, but it has been alleged to be of Chaldean birth and to signify the key of knowledge.
A green precipitate was obtained by dissolving mercury and copper in nitric acid, and precipitating by vinegar. This was also used in syphilis.
Homberg put a little mercury into a bottle and attached it to the wheel of a mill. The metal was thereby transformed into a black powder (the protoxide.)
By a careful and very gradual precipitation of a solution of nitrate of mercury by ammonia Hahnemann obtained what he called soluble mercury. Soubeiran proved that this precipitate was a mixture in variable proportions of sub-nitrate and ammonio-proto-nitrate of mercury.