1050 FOODS AND FOOD ADULTERANTS. 



The petition was referred by the minister to the Comite which appointed 

 the commission just named. A report was rendered December 30, 1878. 

 The result of its deliberations may be summed up as follows: 



The process submitted by MM. Lecourt and Guillemare gives satisfactory results, 

 and from a hygienic standpoint is free from the objections which have been urged 

 against the use of copper and its salts. 



Howeve;, while awarding commendation to the petitioners, the commission regard 

 it as desirable that the Comit6 should express the opinion that, no matter how inof- 

 fensive the means employed, it is desirable that the manufacturers renounce all 

 artificial methods of coloring. It is believed that the public would prefer vegetables 

 of good quality with their natural color to those presenting the seductive green 

 which could be a means of concealing inferior quality. 



This progress in the methods of food preserving, however, furnishes a further rea- 

 son for a more vigorous enforcement of the laws prohibiting the use of salts of copper 

 for coloring vegetables. 



The commendation of the administration should be expressed to the petitioners for 

 the service they have rendered public health. 



This was not altogether unmixed commendation. 



The next appearance of the question is due to MM. Bouchardat and 

 Gautier, who were appointed a commission to investigate the general 

 subject of the artificial coloring of articles of food and drink, and the 

 dangers resulting therefrom, by the organizing committee of the Inter- 

 national Congress of Hygiene, which met in Paris in 1878. That por- 

 tion of their report as delivered to the congress which deals with the 

 subject of artificial greening of preserved vegetables is as follows: 1 



The packing of canned vegetables may be called a French industry. Twenty to 

 twenty-two million packages (demi-boites) of peas, green beans, flageolets, etc., are 

 annually packed, 90 per cent of which are exported. 



Copper-greening of these vegetables has been in use for twenty-five to thirty years 

 and is practiced by nine-tenths of the packers. It originated in the observation that 

 vegetables cooked in copper kettles preserved their color. 



The copper absorbed is deposited in the outer layers of the vegetables, forming a 

 blue albuminate. The color of this deposit, mixed with the yellow produced by the 

 cookery iu the vegetable, forms the green tint so much desired. 



We believe that copper acts largely by virtue of its antiseptic and antifernieuta- 

 tive properties, opposing the action of diastase which would tend to destroy the 

 chlorophyl. To confirm this wo may cite the fact that metals giving colorless 

 albnminates also preserve the color. This is true with zinc and mercury. 



Legumes preserved by the copper process always contain this metal, sometimes in 

 notable quantities and sometimes in mere traces. 



Nine-tenths of the preserved green vegetables sold in France or foreign countries 

 are greened by copper. The process is in use at present in Germany, Italy and 

 Spain. By virtue of a general understanding, every can of legumes sold in France 

 and not bearing the inscription " Legumes au naturel" is known to be greened with 

 copper. 



There are, however, other processes in use. 



Coloring by a lake of chlorophyl is one, the process in which lime sucrate is used 

 is another, the Garges method a third, and, finally and lastly, zinc salts are some- 

 times used. 



1 Comptes rendus utenog. Cougres liitemat. d'hyg., tenu Paris, 1-10 a6ut, 1878 ; 

 Paris, 1880, [10] , 1, 501. 



