No. 5. 



DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



g3 



the jurisdiction of the Commonwealth, and includes no cases which 

 were the subject of adverse reports by the chemists, but in which 

 the Courts failed to find a verdict of guilty. 



If the technical reports were made to correspond precisely with 

 the numbers of samples collected during the year, there is no doubt 

 that the proportion of adulterated or otherwise illegal cases belong- 

 ing to the several classes of food in the above table, would be some- 

 what altered. The figures given will serve, however, in a general 

 way, to indicate the general proportion which adulterated samples 

 bore to the total of those selected by the special agents. It is, of 

 course, readily understood that the degree of representation by pur- 

 chased samples out of the total number of brands of food supplies 

 on sale in the State, is not uniform throughout these classe.s. Thus, 

 in taking samples of milk the sampling agents take samples from 

 every milk dealer in the districts visited, but not every case of eggs 

 on sale in the State is sampled, nor every lot of fresh meat or groc- 

 eries. In a very large proportion of the cases of samples purchased, 

 there is some special peculiarity of label, some new manufacture or 

 some question raised by purchasers or competitors that leads to the 

 selection of materials for examination; whereas goods that have 

 time and again been examined and found free from adulteration un- 

 der the law, are rarely included in the samples selected. 



The condition of the several classes of food supplies examined will 

 be discussed with somewhat detail in later paragraphs of this report. 



PEOSECUTIONS ORDERED IN 1914 



Number of prosecutions ordered for the year 1014 is stated in de- 

 tail in Table No. 3 of the appendix. The following summary states 

 the number ordered in the different mouths of the year past, and 

 also the kinds and number of tlie various classes of foods involved. 



NUMBER ORDERED DURING EACH 

 MONTH: 



January, 64 



February, 22 



March, 80 



April, 152 



May, 92 



June, 75 



July 66 



AuRu.st, 86 



September, 74 



October, 41 



November, 106 



December, 79 



Total, 937 



NUMBER ORDERED UNDER EACH 

 LAW: 



Cream and milk , 285 



Pure food, 223 



Non-alcoholic drinks, 152 



Cold storage, 68 



Ice cream , 50 



Esss, 51 



Oleomargarine, 33 



Vinegar, 26 



Sausage, 25 



Fruit syrup, 7 



Lard, 4 



Cheese, 3 



Renovated butter , 1 



Total, 937 



