THE DANGER OF GASWORKS PITCH 43 



sent us Dr. Legge's original reports on the subject. 

 It seems that while cases of warts and swarthy- 

 skins are very common, and epithelioma fairly 

 frequent, among the workers with gasworks-tar 

 pitch, Dr. Legge could not find these conditions 

 among the comparatively small numbers of 

 workers examined handling blast-furnace tar 

 pitch. Hence in the proposed Home Office Regu- 

 lations the following clause appears : " I hereby 

 . . . make the following Regulations, and direct 

 that they shall apply to all factories and work- 

 shops in which the said manufacture is carried on, 

 except factories or workshops in which no pitch 

 other than blast-furnace pitch is used in the manu- 

 of "briquettes " (the italics are ours). 



We have also made inquiries, and think that 

 there appears to be strong evidence that the warts, 

 epithelioma, etc., are caused only by the gasworks 

 pitch. Blast-furnace pitch is made from tar 

 which is distilled at a lower temperature. The 

 pitches are powdered, mixed with small coals, and 

 compressed into briquettes. The proposed Regu- 

 lations, if enforced, will provide for the establish- 

 ment of bathing accommodation and overalls to 

 protect the men from pitch dust. 



Reverting to the theory that cancer may be due 

 to chemical auxetics and augmentors of cell- 

 division, we undertook some experiments to see 

 whether any such substances could be found in 

 the tars and pitches. We procured samples of 

 both. The method employed need not here be 

 described in detail; but we may mention that 

 in the case of the tars 10 c.c. pf each was mixed 

 with 90 c.c. of a 5-per-cent solution of HC1, 



