54 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



taincd in the hog house; then go to the horse stable, spank 

 the horses over, feed them their grain, curry them and pos- 

 sibly harness them; then go to the cow stable, and, after 

 catching and tying up a calf, sit do^\^l to milk ivitliout wash- 

 ing his hands ? I say, did yon ever see him do all this 

 without washing his hands ? I have, we all have ; and we all 

 know that to milk absolutely dry handed is extremely diffi- 

 cult on many cows, and that not infrequently the lower 

 portion of the hands becomes well washed during the milking 

 process. Where does that dirt go ? Into solution in the milk, 

 and, being in solution, it cannot be strained out through any 

 amount of cheese cloth or even absorbent cotton. 



Imagine with me for a moment that the good housewife 

 beats eggs, mixes cake, kneads bread or does any other sim- 

 ilar piece of food work regularly in so dusty and ill-flavored 

 a place as the ordinary cow stable. How many of us, young 

 men, would be willing to marry into that family ? Would 

 3^ou, Mr. Reader ? As a matter of fact, however, the det- 

 rimental effects which could possibly result from such work, 

 which we would immediately pronounce fearfully dirty, would 

 be nothing of consequence, for the reason that all those foods 

 are thoroughly baked, and thereby sterilized before being con- 

 sumed, whereas milk is consumed raw, and that by our tender- 

 est specimens of humanity. These are not pleasant thoughts, 

 but they are fact thoughts, and this is not a one-sided story. 



Milh as a Disease Carrier. — That epidemics of conta- 

 gious diseases have been brought about through the medium 

 of milk as a carrier of the specific organisms causing the 

 disease has been thoroughly well shown many times. In 

 fact, there are on record authentic instances of 500 epidemics 

 which have occurred within the past thirty-five years, — 317 

 of typhoid, which is now almost exclusively a country dis- 

 ease, brought about by poor sanitation and flies; 125 of scar- 

 let fever and 58 of diphtheria, all of which were traceable 

 definitely to milk, not as a cause but as a carrier of the or- 

 ganisms introduced carelessly or accidentally, either from 

 close contact with a person having the disease, or from the 

 fact that the dairy utensils have been rinsed in water carry- 



