494 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



chief sources of difficulty. He says the waste of child life in 

 densely populated centers, especially in New York, is enormous. 

 Last year the bodies of three thousand and forty-two children 

 under five years of age were received at the morgue and nearly 

 all were buried in Potter's Field, killed by poverty and ignorance, 

 want of jjroper diet and care. In France, out of two hundred and 

 fifty thousand infants dying annually, M. Rouchard, President of 

 the Society for the Protection of Children, says one hundred thou- 

 sand might be saved bj^ careful nursing. This knowledge caused 

 the passage of the bill forbidding the use of solid food for in- 

 fants under one year of age, unless advised by a physician. 



In the effort to guard against the tuberculosis germ our own 

 Government is taking action, and the United States Department 

 of Agriculture, in connection with work upon the forthcoming 

 report upon tuberculosis, has issued a circular giving simple direc- 

 tions for the sterilization of milk. Dr. Salmon, in his report, com- 

 ments upon the danger of contagion, and says the sterilization of 

 milk can be satisfactorily accomplished by a very simple appara- 

 tus, which he describes at length. Any suitable utensil whether 

 a bottle plugged with cotton or a Soxhlet stopper, a fruit jar 

 loosely covered, or whatever vessel may be used is to be placed 

 inside of a larger one of metal containing water, the require- 

 ments being that the interior vessel shall be raised above the bot- 

 tom of the other, and that the water shall reach nearly or quite 

 as high as the milk. The apparatus is then heated until the water 

 reaches 155 F., when it is removed from the heat and kept tight- 

 ly covered for half an hour. The cooling after this should be 

 rapid, and the bottles kept in a low temperature. A hole may 

 be punched in the cover of the pail, a cork inserted, and a chemi- 

 cal thermometer put through the cork, so that the bulb dips into 

 the water, or a dairy thermometer may be used by removing the 

 lid from time to time. 



An ordinary double boiler will be found to meet all the re- 

 quirements, using the dairy thermometer. If preferred, the Ar- 

 nold steamer or the Freeman Pasteurizer will be found convenient. 

 Dr. Chapin says that fifteen minutes' heating will be found suf- 

 ficient, as a rule. 



The problem seems to be, in infant dietetics, to approximate 

 such milk to the composition of human milk. That this can be 

 done has been demonstrated by expert analyses, results showing 

 that the value of this care is not overestimated by those who 

 thoroughly comprehend its purpose. The casein of the milk, 

 being the objectionable feature for infant diet, must be treated 

 in such a manner as to make it digestible, supplying at the same 

 time the constituents required as a consequence of this treatment, 

 by the addition of sugar and fat. 



