44 Ninth Annual Report of the 



with the assistance I was able to procure to determine what, if 

 anything, could be done to assist those in producing milk, to the 

 end that they might send it to the city with as few bacteria of a 

 dangerous character as possible in it. I have consulted with 

 Prof. V. A. Moore of Cornell University, who is eminently 

 qualified, having made it a life study. He has prepared a re- 

 port relative to this question, and from that report I am of the 

 opinion that the danger from this source is not nearly so great 

 as the people have been led to. believe. However, the facts as 

 found by Professor Moore have been placed at your disposal (see 

 Eighth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture), and 

 if in your wisdom it is deemed best to place at the disposal of 

 this Department the necessary means or equipments with which 

 to enter further into this subject, it would probably prove a 

 benefit not only to the milk producing portion of our people 

 but to the consuming public. 



By chapter 153, Laws of 1898, your honorable body provided 

 that no milk cans in which milk had been conveyed to city or 

 town should be returned in a filthy condition or containing any 

 garbage or deleterious milk, but in making this provision it also 

 provides it should not apply to cities of the first class. It is 

 now conceded that this is one of the great sources of food for 

 bacteria, and that great quantities of it exist in cans that are 

 returned from cities of the first class, i. e., New York and Buf- 

 falo. By virtue of that provision this Department is unable to 

 do anything whatever relative to the cans returned to the pro- 

 ducer from the above-named cities. It is a fact well known to 

 all persons who see such cans that many of them are returned 

 reeking with foul odors from garbage of different kinds de- 

 posited therein by some one in the city before returning them. 

 That this garbage is a great source of food for bacteria of all 

 kinds, and more particularly harmful bacteria, cannot be de- 

 nied. This act, in my judgment, should be amended to the end 

 that the law should be applied to all portions of the State with- 

 out exception. 



