68 HOUSEHOLD BACTERIOLOGY 



the persons using the milk ; therefore, in most cases, 

 such additions are contrary to law. 



PRESERVING FOOD 



The following from the U. S. government bulletin 

 on "The Use and Abuse of Food Preservatives," will 

 show us that man has always sought to prevent the 

 use of his food by these micro-organisms : 



"In hot, arid regions the question of the preservation 

 of food is of little interest. An animal may be slain 

 and its carcass hung in the air to dry. Other foods 

 keep correspondingly well. Putrefaction and decay 

 are almost unknown. On the other hand, wherever 

 climatic conditions favor decay this question becomes 

 important, especially for those who live at a distance 

 from markets and who kill and preserve their own 

 meat, and for those who, either on land or sea, are 

 for a number of days remote from a source of supply. 



"The methods most commonly employed for pre- 

 Methods serving food, by drying and smoking and with salt, 

 vinegar, alcohol, and sugar, have long been known. 

 Some of them are probably as old as civilization itself, 

 and indeed are not unknown to many tribes of savages. 

 We are told by Herodotus that the ancient Egyptians 

 were conversant with the art of preserving meat with 

 salt, and six centuries before the Christian era Cyrus 

 sustained his troops on long expeditions with salted 

 meat. The aborigines of North and South America 

 were accustomed to cure their meat by smoking or 

 "jerking" (tearing from the bone in long strips and 



