THE 



ANNUAL CYCLOPAEDIA. 



A 



ADULTERATION OF FOOD. During recent 

 years there has been a great popular outcry in 

 regard to the injurious adulteration of various 

 articles of food, and the newspapers and health 

 journals have been filled with sensational state- 

 ments of the vast amount of dangerous impuri- 

 ties to be found in our food-supply. As a fact, 

 few articles of food are so adulterated as to be 

 hurtful to health; they are more commonly 

 sophisticated by the intermixture of other sub- 

 stances in a manner chiefly injurious to com- 

 mercial interests. It is necessary to distinguish 

 clearly between these two classes of deceptions, 

 so as to estimate the danger from adulteration, 

 and to provide proper safeguards against it. 



Impurities of food may be divided into three 

 classes: 1. Deleterious adulterations, such as 

 the use of red- lead in cayenne pepper, or chro- 

 mate of lead in mustard. 2. By far the largest 

 class, fraudulent adulterations, illustrated by 

 the use of flour in mustard, chicory in coffee, 

 and terra alba in cream of tartar. 3. Acci- 

 dental adulterations, due to the mixture of 

 small amounts of deleterious substances, ow- 

 ing to some imperfection in the process of 

 manufacture. In these cases the amount of 

 impurity is limited, and the effect is unimpor- 

 tant. 



The following statistics show the prevalence 

 and proportion of adulteration of food as re- 

 vealed by recent official investigations abroad 

 and at home. In March, 1883, out of 1,118 

 articles examined at the Paris laboratory by 

 Government officials, 271 were returned as 

 good, 231 as passable, 616 as bad, of which 545 

 were " not injurious," and 71 were pronounced 

 injurious. Wines formed by far the largest 

 portion of articles examined, and, as a rule, 

 were reported as deficient in purity. Of 257 

 samples of milk, 26 were returned as good, 116 

 as passable, and 115 as bad, but not injurious. 

 In Great Britain, since 1875, the Government 

 returns show the following number of arti- 

 cles analyzed, and the percentage of adulter- 

 ation : 



VOL. xxiv. 1 A 



These totals do not represent foods exclu- 

 sively, for drugs, wines, spirits, and beer are 

 included, nor do they cover the whole of Great 

 Britain. As a result of the past five years' of- 

 ficial supervision in that country, the amount 

 of adulteration was reduced only 1-2 per cent 

 Of the samples of milk analyzed, the per cent, 

 of adulterated varied from 26 in 1877 to 20-35 

 in 1882 ; butter, including oleomargarine sold 

 as butter, 12 to 15 per cent. ; groceries, 13 to 

 10 per cent. ; bread and flonr, 6*84 to 4'32 per 

 cent. In Canada, as a result mainly of pub- 

 lishing the names of dealers in impure articles, 

 the amount of adulteration has been greatly 

 reduced. In 1876, when the work began, 51*66 

 per cent, of the articles examined were adul- 

 terated. In 1882 these figures had been re- 

 duced to 25 '66 per cent. 



The reports of State analysts in New York, 

 New Jersey, Massachusetts, Michigan, and 

 other States, all of late date, indicate that 

 staple articles of food, such as are found in or- 

 dinary households, are rarely adulterated with 

 injurious substances. The sophistication of 

 such articles would be about as follows: Spices 

 and condiments, 66 per cent. ; ground coffee, 

 45 per cent. ; tea, 48 per cent. ; sugar, the 

 highest grades rarely, the lower grades, 20 per 

 cent. ; sirup, 50 per cent. ; milk, when not in- 

 spected, 50 per cent. ; flour, none ; bread, about 

 2 per cent. ; cream of tartar and baking-pow- 

 ders, 44 per cent. ;' butter, 40 per cent, (by the 

 substitution of other fats) ; vinegar is rarely 

 adulterated, but is seldom made of cider ; olive- 

 oil, 60 per cent. 



The character of the adulterants employed 



