THE DISEASES OF CATTLE. 363 



that the milk obtained from a cow located in a city, down- 

 cellar location, is just about as good for the purposes of nutri- 

 tion, as a dose of poison. TheJatter may not kill the imbiber 

 outright ; just so of diseased milk ; it reverses the order of 

 physiology, and places the subject in the vicinity of " death's 

 door." 



I am not prepared, at the present moment, to show the path- 

 ological effects of diseased milk on the system of man. Yet 

 the following article, selected from The Boston Medical and 

 Surgical Journal^ seems apropos : — 



" Dr. Parks has had an opportunity of comparing two spec- 

 imens of human milk under the microscope. An apparently 

 healthy American mother gave up nursing her child, for the 

 double reason of an inflammation of the breast, and because 

 the infant did not thrive upon her milk. A wet nurse whose 

 milk was of the same age was obtained, when immediately the 

 child began to improve, and soon became plump and hearty. 

 After a few weeks, the mammary abscess having departed, the 

 milk of the mother and that of the nurse were examined under a 



on which they live. Eighteen pounds of corn and a little straw, given 

 daily, is abundant to keep a cow in good flesh. But to obtain the same 

 quantity of nutritive aliment from swill, 130 gallons of it must be taken 

 daily ; that is, 40 gallons to supply the nitrogen ; 30, to supply the oleag- 

 inous matter ; and 60, to supply the hydro-carbonate. In taking so much 

 swill, a cow will consume daily one quart of vinegar. In the course of 

 the doctor's experiments, he found that this milk gave a strong acid reac- 

 tion ; and, from a series of results derived from personal observation, he 

 had discovered that the milk of unhealthy women, living in damp cellars 

 and eating bad food, or habitually intemperate, exhibited the same char- 

 acteristic. Having thus established, prima fade, his case against swill- 

 milk, the Dr. proceeded to furnish instances in which young children, bom 

 of healthy parents and healthy when born, or brought in a healthy con- 

 dition from the country to the city, had incurred disease by the use of 

 swill-milk, and recovered when it was withheld from them. He exhibited 

 numerous analyses of different kinds of milk, and various microscopic 

 drawings of swill-milk, showing, in every case, conferves and sporads. 

 These were examined with much interest. The Academy resolved to 

 send an engrossed copy to Mayor Tiemann, and return a vote of thanks 

 to the Committee, who were then discharged. — New York Times. 



