272 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



common), is far more dangerous than one who is sick in 

 bed, since the latter can have no direct connection with the 

 milk supply. 



In order to consider the operation of such cases, let us 

 suppose a case. An epidemic of typhoid fever is found to 

 exist in a city of twenty-five thousand people. Twenty 

 cases or more of typhoid fever are reported to the city 

 board of health. There are fifty milkmen who supply the 

 city with milk from the neighboring towns. All of these 

 cases of typhoid fever, or nearly all, are customers of one 

 milkman. This circumstance directs the attention of the 

 board of health to this milk route, and, on further investi- 

 gation, a case of typhoid fever is found to exist at the dairy 

 where the milk is produced, and a careless method of hand- 

 ling the milk is also found to exist. I need not specify the 

 circumstances which are often found to exist in actual ex- 

 perience. The evidence of these facts is in most instances 

 sufiicient to establish a presumptive connection at least be- 

 tween the typhoid fever at the dairy and that which exists 

 on the route of the distributer. 



Within the past ten years I have been called to investi- 

 gate several outbreaks of another disease, — trichinosis, — 

 which is not very common among the native New England 

 population. It is always and invariably due to one cause, 

 — the eating of pork, and also of uncooked or insufiiciently 

 cooked pork. Fifty cases and five deaths occurred from 

 this cause in the town of Colrain in Franklin County a few 

 years since, all among Germans or other European immi- 

 grants, and all were due to eating raw pork. The disease 

 in the hog is caused by bad methods of feeding, and it usu- 

 ally exists in a very considerable percentage of hogs which 

 are swill-fed. The State Board of Health, during the past 

 few years, has conducted experiments at two State institu- 

 tions which show that the disease may be entirely prevented 

 in the hog by cooking his food, and by ceasing to feed out 

 the entrails of slaughtered hogs. 



I have said enough in this direction to establish two im- 

 portant principles in regard to farm and dairy work : first, 

 the necessity of absolute cleanliness in every department of 

 work ; and, second, the rule which I have already stated, — 



