N'o. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 425 



is necessary to draiu or till all swampy places, to screen the eistcru 

 Hud rain barrel and to put two or three ounces of kerosene in the 

 privy every few weeks. Inasmuch as mosquitoes do not stray far 

 from home, but are "born and bred" where they are, it becomes a 

 very easy thing- to eliminate them in an isolated place; in a town 

 unless everybody falls in line, it is a ditferent story. 



The cow stable is another point which directly affects the farm 

 people, and sometimes other people who don't live on the farm. 

 Cows are very prone to tuberculosis, and although there has been 

 much discussion lately as to the interchaugeableness of bovine and 

 human tuberculosis, the weight of opinion at present favors the 

 idea of the transmission of tuberculosis from cattle to man. 



Damp, dark and filthy stables are predisposed to the disease, and 

 to avoid this, cleanliness should be enforced and there should be 

 plenty of fresh air and sunlight. Home other diseases, such as ty- 

 phoid fever, diphtheria and scarlet fever, have been traced to pol- 

 luted milk, and in the great cities the terrible infant mortality of 

 summer has been charged to the same cause. So even if we elimi- 

 nate tuberculosis as one of the results of filthy milk, there is still 

 enough danger left to stimulate us to use every precaution. 



In order then to have good, pure and healthy milk, we must of 

 course, have good cows to start with, and they must be housed iu 

 clean, airy stables, and after this the whole secret is cleanliness. 

 The milkers should be clean, but they do not necessarily need to be 

 dressed in white duck. There are only three things necessary, by 

 the way, for cleanliness, and these are soap, water and inclination, 

 and the greatest of the three is inclination. 



The milking utensils must of course be clean, plain open pails and 

 a new cheese cloth strainer, which is thrown away after use. 



Cooling the milk is the next most important thing — the whole 

 future of the milk depending upon it, especially if it is intended for 

 transportation. The great difficulty about this is, that the chilling 

 to be effective must get to 45 degrees, whereas the spring which 

 are generally used for this purpose, do not get below fifty, conse- 

 quently ordinary milk "turns" very readily. 



These points about milk which I have called attention to, are 

 the recommendations of the New York Milk Commission, and milk 

 is now sold in New York which has been prepared according to their 

 directions; and the time is fast coming when the people everywhere 

 will demand better and purer milk, but of course the price will be 

 proportionately higher — high enough at least, to pay for the extra 

 care. 



One other subject I wish to speak about and thnt is the spread of 

 cantagious diseases from farmhouses. Inasmuch as our laws for 

 the rural districts are very lax in this regard we should ourselves 

 28 



