268 MILK AND THE PUBLIC HEALTH CH. xv 



sold in special dairies, or sold in small shops, which only sell 

 milk as an incidental part of their business. 



Delivery of milk in bottles appears to be rare in this 

 country. The milk is usually taken round in a churn, and 

 the quantity required for each customer withdrawn by a dipper 

 and poured direct into the jug or other vessel of the customer. 

 It is not an ideal method, and a certain amount of contamina- 

 tion of the milk is likely to result. 



The dairy shops scattered about the towns are usually 

 scrupulously clean, the milk vessels are equally clean, and the 

 attendant neat and tidy. Indeed, for those who know the 

 average conditions under which milk is produced, and the 

 gross contamination to which the milk sold in such dairies 

 has probably been subjected, there is keen irony in the 

 beautiful surroundings which envisage the milk as soon as it 

 comes within the purview of the consumer, and a whited 

 sepulchre comparison is felt to be not unwarranted. 



The small shop which only sells milk as an incidental part 

 of its trade is an absurd anomaly, but such shops are very 

 common (see Figs. 20 and 21). In Colchester, 1 for example, 

 a town of 40,000 inhabitants, there were 37 such milk sellers 

 registered when a special enquiry was made by the writer in 

 1904. They were for the most part small general provision 

 shops, selling only small quantities of milk, very rarely more 

 than 3 to 4 gallons a day. In only a few were objectionable 

 substances, such as fish or paraffin, also sold, because this had 

 been stopped some years earlier. Not a single one of the 

 counter pans was covered, although most of the shops were 

 very dusty, and many were full of flies. 



Newman 2 found in the Borough of Finsbury (London), 

 when special enquiry was made by him in 1903, that there 

 were 261 milk vendors registered: 40 were confectioners 

 or maintained coffee -shops, leaving 221 who sold milk 

 for consumption off the premises. The latter consisted of 

 39 so-called dairies and 182 general shops. All 221 milk- 

 shops were inspected, and 116 (52 per cent) were found 

 to have one or more sanitary defects. As a rule, the most 

 defective premises were those used for general purposes, and 



1 Annual Jleport, 1904. 

 2 Report on the Milk Supply of Finsbury ,1903. 



