120 FARMERS' INSTITUTES. 



Josiah K. Brown, for 1886 says that there has been paid into the State- 

 treasury during the past year on account of fines for viohition of th6 dairy 

 laws, more particularly those relating to tlie manufacture and sale of oleomar- 

 garine, S2,288.si. Comr. Brown says he has been somewhat retarded in his 

 work by the adverse decisions of the courts, as in what is known as the Marx 

 case, in which it was held that the law prohibiting the sale and manufacture 

 of oleaginous substances, other than that made from pare milk or cream, 

 and designed to take the place of butter, was unconstitutional. ' This decis on,*" 

 he says, ' has worked to the disadvantage of those who have been anxious to 

 suppress the sale of spurious articles of the character mentioned. Dealers ia 

 imitations have in many instances boldly defied even the laws that are, beyond 

 question, valid. Notwithstanding these obstacles much has been done to bring 

 offenders to justice. There are now upwards of "-iOO cases in the courts. Many 

 careful tests have been and are constantly being made throughout the State^ 

 which fully sustain the correctness of the milk standard established by the acts 

 of 1884. Although the sale of imitation butter has been reduced in this State 

 the sales in the United States, as a whole, have materially increased since 

 1883. The report includes a paper from Dr. R. D. Clark, of this city, who 

 gives it as his opinion that oleomargarine is dangerous to health because it is 

 indigestible, is insoluble when made from animal fats, and is liable to carry the 

 germs of disease into the human system, and because in the eagerness of the 

 manufacturers to produce the spurious compound cheaply, ingredients enter 

 into it which are detrimental to the last degree to the consumer's health.' " 



Appleton's Encyclopedia says: — "Oleomargarine, strictly speaking, is not 

 butter, but is the butter fat obtained from beef fat according to the Mege pro- 

 cess; while oleomargarine butter, or butterine, is the product of churning 

 oleomargarine with milk, thus converting it into butter." Dr. Henry A. Motfc 

 has made an elaborate analysis of oleomargarine, from which it appears that 

 its constituents are: — 



Water 11.203 



Butter soUds - 88.7y7 



100. 

 The constituents of cream butter are: — 



Water 11.968 



Butter solids 88.032 



100. 



Thus it seems plain that every element which enters into the composition of 

 the best dairy butter is to be found in oleomargarine butter, and no element is 

 present in the latter which is not present in the former. The only difference 

 between the two products is in the proportion of volatile fats which give the 

 aroma and flavor to butter, and at the same time decompose and render the 

 product rancid. The amount of these volatile fats in oleomargarine butter is 

 sufficient to give to the product the so much prized flavor and odor, but not 

 sufficient when decomposed to make the product rancid ; and for this reason 

 oleomargarine butter keeps sweet and pure for a much longer period than 

 dairy butter. 



At the works of the Commercial Manufacturing Co., New York, 50,000 

 pounds of butter are made daily, all of which finds a ready sale, the price 

 ranging from 15 cents to 22 cents, according to the season and to the form in 

 which it is put up. By law, every tub or package of butter sold must be 



