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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



the why and wherefore is " a bore" — science is " bosh" 

 —and reading is " book farming." Even those who 

 would not discourage attention to science, &c., do not 

 possess, usually, that intimacy with it to enable them to 

 direct their studies, and thus assume a very superior 

 position to their pupils. Of course we speak generally ; 

 for there are to our own knowledge gentlemen who per- 

 form the duty they undertake with scrupulous care and 



great efficiency, and whose praises are upon the lips of 

 all who have been so fortunate as to have received in- 

 struction from them. But it is the knowledge of these 

 few model teachers which causes us so much dissatisfac- 

 tion with the many, the very many inferior ones. 



Mr. Bond has done signal service in opening up this 

 subject, and we hope it may not be dropped until some 

 good remedial measures are struck out. 



THE MORALITY OF TRADE, 



There is nothing, it is said, of which we eat or drink, 

 that does not undergo some species of adulteration, 

 ■whereby a wholesome and nutritious article is often 

 made more or less poisonous : every thing that the 

 hand of fraud can touch is tampered with. Without 

 admitting these assertions to their full extent, it can- 

 not bo denied that gross frauds are continually com- 

 mitted, both here and elsewhere, on thepublic.and that 

 the morality of trade is at a very low ebb. The object 

 of Mr. Scholefield's Bill on the Adulteration of Food 

 and Drinks, is to put an end to many of these frauds, 

 and to afford a security for the health and pocl<et of 

 the public. The Law Courts are continually occupied 

 with cases of palpable frauds : witness the case of the 

 surreptitious use of one man's casks and repute, to 

 further the sale of a totally diffferent compound. 



Professor Levi, of King's College, who is well 

 known for his labours in the department of Com- 

 mercial Law, recently in a paper at the Society of Arts, 

 upon the fraudulent use of trade-marks, gave some 

 glaring instances of the unscrupulousness of home and 

 foreign pirates, who avail themselves of every means of 

 filching the character, reputation, and symbols of 

 others, to further their own interested and unprincipled 

 views. The paper, however, dealt chiefly with articles 

 of manufacture capable of bearing a trade-mark; and it 

 was recommended that there should be a public re- 

 gister of trade-marks, where manufacturers should be 

 able to enter their stamps, marks, or labels, and the 

 imitation or illegal use of which should be felony. Sir 

 Richard Bethel I, who presided, also threw out some 

 very valuable and practical suggestions. 



Without going into the consideration of the fraud- 

 ulent imitation of our manufactures, so extensively 

 carried on by unscrupulous foreigners, or entering upon 

 the question here of pirated trade-marks and the foist- 

 ing of much inferior trash upon the public under de- 

 ceptive cloaks, a few words upon the frequent adul- 

 teration of articles in which our readers are more im- 

 mediately interested may not be out of place. We have 

 never read, "What to Eat, Drink, and Avoid;" but 

 if the author is a man of sense, judging by the prcju- 

 diced outcry against all articles, we shotild think he has 

 excluded every thing but potatoes and distilled water. 

 Some of our readers may remember when Mr. Accum 

 published a work, which he chose, to call " Death in 

 the Pot," Everybody was dreadfully alarmed, aud 

 felt disposed to leave off eating if possible. A death's- 



head and cross-bones shadowed themselves forth on 

 every platter and in every tureen. Frying-pan, grid- 

 iron, oven proper and Dutch-oven were regarded as 

 the lurking-places of death, as well as "the pot." 

 Since then we have had medical inquiries, ana- 

 lytical commissions. Parliamentary committees, and 

 microscopic examinations and works by the dozen, ex- 

 posing frauds and falsifications. And much good all 

 these have certainly done by putting customers on thiir 

 guard, and warning purveyors and dealers that their 

 proceedings were suspected and investigated. 



We have little to complain of, in the ingredients of 

 our daily bread in London, especially if we patronize a 

 " full-price" baker. In the country, however, we 

 fear there is much adulteration carried on — some 

 harmless, as the admixture of rice fl.our and Indian 

 corn meal; others positively injurious. Bean meal is 

 largely used as an ingredient. We have ourselves 

 bought a very fine quality which is commonly vended 

 at Birmingham. Mr. Postgate, a scientific chemist 

 in that town, states that bean meal is regularly mixed 

 with wheat flour in the proportion of one sack of the 

 former to fifteen of the latter. Bean meal may be de- 

 tected by the smell, on pouring boiling w^ter on the 

 flour. But flour is also adulterated with chalk, gyp- 

 sum, and China clay. All these may be detected by 

 burning a small quantity of the flour entirely away, 

 when the mineral substance will remain unconsumed. 

 A miller and flour-dealer at Rotherham was convicted, 

 a few years ago, of adulterating flour with gypsum in 

 the proportion of 4 per cent. At Lincoln, a dealer 

 was convicted on two charges of having a quantity of 

 sulphate of lime upon his premises, and of having 

 mixed it with flour intended for human food. Two 

 millers were also recently convicted at Leeds, in the 

 penalty of £20, for having adulterated flour in their 

 possession, which on analysis was found to contain oil 

 of vitriol and oxide of iron. Chalk may be easily de- 

 tected by mixing a teaspoonful of flour in half a wine- 

 glass of cold water, and adding twenty or more drops 

 of muriatic acid, when the chalk will betray itself by 

 effervescence. Potatoes ai'c also used in bread, chiefly 

 to improve the texture. If much is put in, the taste 

 betrays it ; but a little good mashed potato rather im. 

 proves the bread than otherwise. 



There are numerous dealers in flour and mill offal 

 in the Canadian towns— Quebec, Montreal, Kingston, 

 Coburg, Toronto, and Hamilton, whose business it is 



