Pill box containing '...Borax...'. Borax, also known as sodium borate or sodium tetraborate is used in various industrial processes including paper, glass and china making it is also used in laundry detergents. It is moderately toxic and so should be handled with care.

This sample and pill box come from a 14-drawer cabinet found in the Herschel family home in the 1950s. The contents of this and a similar cabinet seem to suggest that they were used by successive generations of the family to store specimens, material and apparatus for carrying out experiments.

This is one of a set of pill boxes each containing a different chemical or mineral sample presumably used by John F.W. Herschel and/ or his children (it may even have been used by John F.W. with his children) as the raw materials for experiments.