778 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



may do it, but is not to be relied upon. I need only to refer gener- 

 ally to the cases of wholesale infection that have recently been traced 

 to the milk of particular dairies, as the particulars are familiar to all 

 who read the newspapers. 



It is an open question whether butter may or may not act as a dan- 

 gerous carrier of such germs ; whether they rise with the cream, sur- 

 vive the churning, and flourish among the fat. The subject is of vital 

 importance, and yet, in spite of the research-fund of the Royal Society, 

 the British Association, etc., we have no data upon which to base even 

 an approximately sound conclusion. 



We may theorize, of course ; we may suppose that the bacteria, 

 bacilli, etc., which we see under the microscope to be continually 

 wriggling about or driving along, are doing so in order to obtain fresh 

 food from the surrounding liquid, and therefore that, if imprisoned in 

 butter, they would languish and die. We may point to the analogies 

 of ferment-germs which demand nitrogenous matter, and therefore 

 suppose that the pestiferous wanderers can not live upon a mere hydro- 

 carbon like butter. On the other hand, we know that the germs of 

 such things can remain dormant under conditions that are fatal to 

 their parents, and develop forthwith when released and brought into 

 new surroundings. These speculations are interesting enough, but in 

 such a matter of life and death to ourselves and our children we re- 

 quire positive facts, direct microscopic evidence. 



In the mean time the doubt is highly favorable to hosch. To illus- 

 trate this, let us suppose the case of a cow grazing on a sewage-farm 

 manured from a district on which enteric fever has existed. The cow 

 lies down and its teats are soiled with liquid containing the germs 

 which are so fearfully malignant when taken internally. In the course 

 of milking, a thousandth part of a grain of the infected matter con- 

 taining a few hundred germs enters the milk, and these germs increase 

 and multiply. The cream that rises carries some of them with it, and 

 they are thus in the butter, either dead or alive, we know not which, 

 but have to accept the risk. 



Now, take the case of bosch. The cow is slaughtered. The waste 

 fat, that before the days of palm-oil and vaseline was sold for lubri- 

 cating machinery, is skillfully prepared, made up into two-pound rolls, 

 delicately wrapped in special muslin or prettily molded and fitted 

 into " Normandy " baskets. What is the risk in eating this ? 



None at all, provided always the bosch is not adulterated with 

 cream-butter. The special disease-germs do not survive the chemistry 

 of digestion, do not pass through the glandular tissues of the follicles 

 that secrete the living fat, and therefore, even though the cow should 

 have fed on sewage-grass, moistened with infected sewage- water, its 

 fat would not be poisoned. 



What we require in connection with this is commercial honesty, 

 that the thousands of tons of bosch now annually made be sold as 



