

MILK DANGERS AND REMEDIES 129 



Milk may also contain bacteria characterised by 

 their remarkable resistance to heat, which is due 

 to their possessing what is known as the hardy 

 spore in addition to the ordinary rod form. The 

 numbers in which they are present in milk varies 

 with different samples ; but they may be taken as 

 a sort of index as to the care observed in milking, 

 for they are always present in great quantity in 

 uncleanly-collected milk. Careful studies have 

 been made of this class of milk bacteria by Pro- 

 fessor Fliigge and others, and it has been found 

 that when added to milk upon which puppies were 

 subsequently fed the latter succumbed under 

 symptoms of violent diarrhoea. 



The danger of even a few bacteria gaining 

 access to milk is serious, on account of the 

 fabulous rapidity with which they multiply when 

 they find themselves in such congenial surround- 

 ings. Professor Freudenreich has made very ex- 

 haustive investigations to show how milk microbes 

 may multiply in the time which elapses between 

 milking and the receipt of the milk by the con- 

 sumer. The following example will convey some 

 notion of what bacterial propagation under these 

 circumstances is capable of. 



The sample of milk in question was found to 

 possess on reaching the laboratory, two and a half 



r UN 



THF 



UNIVERSITY 



or 



