ADULTEKATION. 



dies. The precautions against the sale of the 

 meat of diseased animals are declared to be 

 anything but sufficient. The adulterations of 

 wines and liquors have often been exposed to 

 the public: coarse rums, potato spirits, and 

 not infrequently wood alcohol, are used as the 

 foundation of liquors and wines ; sulphuric 

 acid is employed in the manufacture of port, 

 sherry, and madeira wines, and of pale malt. 

 At least half of the vinegar sold in the cities 

 is said to contain active poisons : preparations 

 of lead, copper, and sulphuric acid are used 

 in its manufacture. Confectionery is colored 

 with poisonous materials, to which more than 

 once the attention of the public has been di- 

 rected : cochineal, red lead, and bichromate 

 of lead are used to produce the red 'and pink 

 colors; chromate of lead, gamboge, turmeric, 

 and Naples yellow to color yellow ; litmus, in- 

 digo, Prussian blue, carbonate of copper, and 

 other colors for the blues ; acetate of copper, 

 arseniate of copper, emerald-green, Scheele's 

 green, and Brunswick green for the green 

 shades; while weight is imparted by terra 

 alba, chalk, and such substances. Soap is often 

 colored with irritating skin-poisons. Olive oil 

 is one of the most universally adulterated arti- 

 cles, and is most frequently made of oil extract- 

 ed from hemp, rape, cotton, or mustard seed, 

 or from the peanut. Bright green pickles, col- 

 ored as they are with acetate of copper, have 

 been the cause of frequent cases of poisoning. 

 Mustard is almost never pure. The different 

 pungent table sauces are often flavored with 

 noxious chemicals. Cayenne pepper is adul- 

 terated with cinnabar, vermilion, and sulphuret 

 of copper, and colored with red lead and Vene- 

 tian red. Cocoa is weighted with sulphate or 

 carbonate of lime, and colored with red lead, 

 vermilion, and ocher. 



The most insidious and deadly results of the 

 reckless use of poisons in manufactures proba- 

 bly arise from the extensive use of arsenic for 

 colors and dyes, and the use of lead in food- 

 vessels. The amount of arsenic imported into 

 the United States every year would furnish 

 deadly doses enough to kill six times as many 

 human beings as make up the present popula- 

 tion of the earth. It is sold in the market at 

 1$ to 2 cents a pound, and is handled like coal 

 or stone. This terrible mineral furnishes the 

 color for innumerable articles of every -day use 

 lamp-shades, fancy wrapping papers, tickets, 

 artificial flowers, dried grasses, eye-shades so 

 that in nearly every house and every room the 

 fine particles of this poison are floating in the 

 air, finding their way into the human system, 

 and producing their sickening and debilitating 

 effects. Various materials of clothing dress- 

 goods, veils, sewing-silks, stockings, gentle- 

 men's underwear, gloves, linings of hats and 

 of boots and shoes are colored with arsenic. 

 Professor Nichols of the Massachusetts Insti- 

 tute of Technology found 8 grains of arsenic 

 in every square foot of a ladies' dress pattern ; 

 10 grains have been detected in a single artifi- 



cial flower. A veil thrown over the crib of an 

 infant recently caused its death; gentlemen 

 have been severely poisoned by the arsenic 

 contained in their underclothing. Arsenic has 

 been found in toilet powders and in candles, 

 and is used to color all sorts of fabrics. But 

 the most extensive and most injurious applica- 

 tion of the destructive agent is to color wall- 

 papers. A great variety of colors green, blue, 

 red, yellow, and all their shades are produced 

 and employed on all grades and styles of paper- 

 hangings. A book exhibiting 75 specimens of 

 arsenic-containing wall-papers, to which the 

 impressive title of "Shadows from the Walls 

 of Death " was given, was published and dis- 

 tributed by the Board of Health of Michigan 

 to warn the people against the use of such 

 papers. A great number of deaths and innu- 

 merable cases of poisoning are supposed to 

 have resulted from such poisonous wall-hang- 

 ings. The arsenical papers, it is stated, are 

 for sale in every town and village in the State. 

 The citizens are advised to buy no paper with- 

 out having it first tested for arsenic, and, in 

 case their walls are already covered with poi- 

 sonous hangings which can not easily be re- 

 moved, to coat them with varnish as affording 

 a certain measure of protection. 



Lead-poisoning is supposed to have become 

 in the most recent period a still more preva- 

 lent, though subtiler and more insidious, cause 

 of suffering and death than arsenical poisoning. 

 Lead is a cumulative poison, and the least 

 particles gathering consecutively in the system 

 retain their baneful powers until quantities 

 have been taken sufficient to produce disease, 

 paralysis, and death. The dangers from drink- 

 ing water which has been conducted through 

 lead pipes has been often impressed upon the 

 people by medical authors. Pipes of galvan- 

 ized iron are said to be quite as bad as lead 

 pipes. A still more dangerous source of lead- 

 poisoning has lately been introduced to the 

 attention of the public. The tin vessels which 

 are used in every household to hold milk and 

 other fluids, and often for cooking purposes, 

 are said to be made, not of pure tin, but more 

 frequently of an alloy of tin and lead. The 

 lead is easily decomposed by acids, and salts of 

 lead become mixed with the food or drink. A 

 Michigan physician found that a number of 

 cases which had been taken for chorea were in 

 reality paralysis agitans caused by this kind of 

 lead-poisoning. Many cases of the death of 

 children from meningitis, fits, and paralytic 

 affections were traced to the same cause, the 

 children having imbibed the poison in milk 

 which had been kept in cans of this alloy, the 

 acid of the milk having dissolved the lead. 

 Fruit acids will act much quicker upon the 

 alloy. An examination of a large number of 

 tin vessels by the Michigan Board of Health 

 showed that nearly every sample contained 

 lead alloy, and many of them a large propor- 

 tion of lead. Dr. Emil Querner of Philadel- 

 phia, in testing a large number of tin vessels, 



