The Victorian era, just as Industrialization was taking hold, was a time for great experimentation. We marvel now at what over-the-counter cough syrup used to contain! And Victorian homes and factories were not safe places. Because we were learning what "safe" actually meant in the era of industrialization.

I am just a little but too young to have had a chemistry set but they appeared sometimes in the sort of "boys own" fiction I sometimes read. The attitude around how they were put together and sold is definitely a remnant of how "safety" was such an after-thought in earlier times.

Wade.