ddS 



FARMERS' REGISTER. 



[No. 11 



infirm, to feed the poor and (he needy, but even to 

 gratify and to satiate tiic ever-craviiijr and tlie 

 pampered appetites of ilie sensualist ; tliatas yet 

 we liave not iearncd fijliy or perliap^ fairly to ap- 

 preciate litem, or liiis among die many itounlies 

 of an ever-good and aii ail-wise Providence. 

 Yours truly, 



W. A. Seely. 



From tiie Journal of Coniirierce. 

 MILK. 



\_Frpm a correspondent in Europe] 



It is <rralilying to see, from the columns of your 

 paper, that deep interest has been awakened in re- 

 gard to the quality of milk used in the ciiy. [l 

 would seem as if no parent who reflects that the 

 bones and muscles and constitutions of his chil- 

 dren are composed from this very milk, could hesi- 

 tate to incur any expense, to make any efforts which 

 his circumstances permit, to ensure a supply of the 

 very best material for his purpose. Even the most 

 rigid economy requires it whether we ihink of the 

 expense of a lijeble family, or of the continued de- 

 mands which they often make upon parents, even 

 after they are sent forth into the world. 1 cannot 

 but hope that this feeling will even aid in the pro- 

 motion of the northern rail-roads, li^om which it is 

 most truly observed the most effectual relief can be 

 afibrded. It may be said, mdeed, that pure milk 

 can be procured from the fiirms which abound in 

 every direction from New York. But let it be re- 

 membered it must be transported for several hours 

 in conveyances which would serve admirably ibr 

 locomotive churns — which cannot fail to prepare the 

 milk to become speedily sour, whatever may be its 

 original quality, unless indeed it may have been 

 previously diluted and whitened witli lime water. — 

 On a rail-road, ii may be brought six times the dis- 

 tance in the same period, and almost without per- 

 ceptible motion ; to say nothing of the greater se- 

 curity of good food in places where grass is cheap- 

 er than slops, or even the mixMure of decayed vege- 

 tables and parings and remnants of salad, &c. 

 which form the refuse of the kitchen, and which 

 are so often procured as a dainty morsel for the 

 cow, to be returned afterwards in the form of pure 

 milk! 



I have recently met with a report addressed to 

 the Medical Society of Paris, on the subject of milk, 

 which shows the importance of procuring this food 

 of children from the purest source, in a new 

 light; and proves that •' distillery slojis " are not 

 the onlj' thing injurious to its ijualiiy. Messrs. Pe- 

 tit and D'Arcet, distinguished chemists in Paris, 

 were led to examine minutely the quality of differ- 

 ent specimens of milk, from observing iheir very 

 different effects npnn children. Some thai they 

 examined, and which they found to be s[)eedily 

 thrown up by the children in coagulated masses, 

 was proved by chemical tests to have a predomi- 

 nance of acidity, ihouijh it was not perceptible to 

 the taste. Oiher portions which were welldrirest- 

 ed', were provec! to have a predominance ofalkali, 

 which is considered the natural condition of milk'. 

 On inquiry, it was found that the cows fioui which 

 the first milk was obtained, were/eti in the stable, 

 with reiunants of vegetable? as welt as bay, and al- 

 most without movement — lluil the alkaline and 

 healthy milk was from cows allowed to range and 

 fezd in the meadows, 



These observations led them to examine the va- 

 rying qualities of milk on a more extensive scale, 

 as to the simple fiict of the predominance of acid or 

 iilkali, and Ibr this pur[)0se they availed themselves 

 of a test which may be procured wiihout difficulty 

 from a chemist. Ii is paper dipped in a solution of 

 litmus. Jf It be of good quality, the blue color 

 will be changed to red by a fluid which is acid. A 

 tincture of the blue cabbage will detect acidity al- 

 so, if it is sufficiently fresh, in the same way. 



During a voyage through Flanders, M. D'Arcet 

 in company with the celebrated chemist Gay Lus- 

 sac, visited some of the best dairies, in which the 

 cows are fed upon the meadows, and found the 

 milk without exception, to contain a predominance 

 of alkali. They examined the milk of cows fed in 

 the stall on turnips, the leaves of vegetables, &c. 

 which were only allowed to pass two hours a day 

 in the meadows, and found it as unilbrmly acid. 



The same experiment was repeated in the gra- 

 zing regions in the north of France, and uniformly 

 with the same results. 



It would seem then to fie fully ascertained, that 

 pure and perfect milk can only be given by cows 

 that pass the ijreater part of the day in the mea- 

 dows during the mild season, and that it cannot be 

 furnished by cows which are fed upon the parings 

 and tops of vegetables or other food than the grass- 

 es, and are deprived of exercise — to say nothing 

 of the pernir-ious effects of the distillery slops or 

 the sour and putrid remnants of the kitchen. And 

 yet this milk must be the staff of liltj of childhood — 

 the stafi'of which its bones and sinews are formed ; 

 and its quality will do much in determining the lee- 

 blenessor vigor of the next generation in your city. 

 It is too true that the impure and often infected air, 

 and the limited exercise of children in a city — ad- 

 ded to the incessant and intense excitement of its 

 movement and bustle — while they often render 

 childhood precocious, and youth premature, lead 

 to decay equally premature in a generation taken 

 together. But surely this is an additional reason 

 for seeking the purest and best possible nourish- 

 ment in order to counteract these inevitable causes 

 of decline. 



I am sure that many a mother will thank me for 

 adding that thesechemists, on observing variations 

 equally Great in the digestion of children fed by 

 different nurses, found the same difference in the 

 quality of their milk — and that which was thrown 

 up frequently coagulated, was uniformly sour when 

 it was received — not to the taste always — but as 

 tested by litmus paper. They observe that the 

 child is not only deprived in this manner of suita- 

 ble food, but he is obliged to call for it 40 or 50 

 times a day, in place of 4 or 5 times, and thus fa- 

 tigues and inpires her own stomach, wiihoul being 

 nourished, and wearies and exhausts his nurse so 

 as to rende.'- the quality of the milk still worse. — 

 Such a state of things, they say, ought immediate- 

 ly to be remedied, and that it can olien be done by 

 giving the mother or nurse a more simple diet, or 

 by means of medicine, which a judicious physician 

 can prescribe, among which they consider minute 

 doses of super-carbonate ofsoda the best. 



But can nothinix be done to paliate the evil until 

 we can procure pure miik? M. D'Arcet made 

 the experiment in his own family of adding one 

 half a grain of super-carbonate of soda to a pint of 

 milk from a city f»!d cow, and succeeded in render- 

 ing it harmless at least, and far more nutritious. — 



