Ao. 4.] REPORT OF DAIRY BUREAU. 251 



lature in its annual reports the best suggestions which these 

 various local officers annually make to their respective city 

 governments. 



In the year 1894 the annual agitation for a reduction in 

 the milk standard resulted in a compromise measure, which 

 appeared on the surface to be a harmless though useless 

 piece of legislation, enacting into a statute certain require- 

 ments as to the taking of samples which had already been in 

 force through the operation of the well-established laws of 

 evidence. This statute was opposed by the Bureau on the 

 ground, first, that it was unnecessary, and second, that it 

 might contain some loopholes through which dishonest milk- 

 men would gain a point. The law was so objectionable that 

 the governor refused to sign it, though he allowed it to 

 become operative by the lapse of time without a veto. The 

 law alluded to is chapter 425 of the Acts of 1894, and is as 

 follows : — 



No producer of milk shall be liable to prosecution on the ground 

 that the milk produced by him is not of good standard quality, 

 unless the milk alleged not to be of such quality was taken upon 

 the premises or while in the possession or under the control of the 

 producer by an inspector of milk or by the agents of the Dairy 

 Bureau or State Board of Health, or collector of samples duly 

 authorized by such inspector, and a sealed sample of the same 

 given to the producer. 



In the trial of a case where the defendant was charged with 

 having in his possession milk below the standard quality, the 

 evidence tended to prove that the defendant was the producer 

 of the milk in question, and, at the time the sample was taken 

 from his servant, was at his farm in another city. The court 

 was asked to rule that there was a variance between the com- 

 plaint and the proof, and that the evidence would not war- 

 rant a verdict of guilty. The court declined so to rule ; the 

 defendant was convicted ; exceptions were taken and over- 

 ruled by the supreme court. In its opinion the supreme 

 court said : — 



It is the general rule of law that the possession of a servant is 

 the possession of the master. In the present case, we think that 



