No. 4.] REPORT OF DAIRY BUREAU. 395 



violation of that law, except when oleomargarine is served 

 in hotels and restaurants without giving notice. 



In the above 60 oleomargarine cases, 2 were nol prossed 

 and there were 5 acquittals, leaving convictions in 55 cases, 

 as against IG in 1898 and 21 in 1897. No cases appealed 

 to the superior court have been lost. Exceptions have been 

 saved for the supreme court on three points. In a majority 

 of cases where the anti-color law was violated the oleomar- 

 garine was sold as and for butter, so that there was a com- 

 mercial and moral fraud, as well as a violation of the statute. 

 In one case we found the marks and brands required by the 

 national government erased from the tub, and in place thereof 

 the stencil " From J. D. Smith's Creamery, Sudbury, Ver- 

 mont." An inspector was sent to Sudbury to investigate, 

 and found no such creamery in the place. 



Though the sale of oleomargarine has been pushed harder 

 than ever before in the State, the law has been enforced with 

 such efficiency that the veteran market reporter of one of the 

 leading daily papers of Boston, who is remarkably well 

 informed, in summing up the situation says : " Although 

 oleomargarine seems to be interfering considerably with the 

 consumption of genuine butter in the west, we do not think 

 it cuts much of a figure here." 



In a number of instances our agents have found shipments 

 of oleomargarine in transit, and following it to the place of 

 delivery have traced it to some State institution, in one case 

 to a soldiers' home. Thus in many instances the State is 

 holding out temptation to law breakers, and giving a coun- 

 terfeit article to the unfortunate inmates of our eleemosynary 

 institutions, not excepting the veterans who risked their 

 lives in the defence of their country. 



Dr. Harrington, the Boston milk inspector, for several 

 months prosecuted restaurant keepers for the sale of an imi- 

 tation of yellow butter ; but after awhile he ran against a 

 snag in the person of a judge who held that complaints ought 

 not to be brought under that act, because restaurant keepers 

 are especially mentioned in another, and discharged the 

 defendant. Acting on what he believed to be good advice, 

 the inspector entered more cases under slightly different 

 pleadings, got convictions, and the defendants appealed to 



