LOCAL A UTHORIT Y AXD MILK SUP PL Y 463 



from London for 25, 50, 100, and 150 miles. Of course, actually 

 the distances by rail from London are much greater. But even 

 this rough and ready method gives an approximate idea of the 

 great distances which London milk travels before it reaches the 

 milk-shop. On the map 280 towns and villages are marked. The 

 distances of these places, in straight measurement, are as follows : — 



Within the 25 mile radius there are 2 ( 07 per cent) 



50 „ „ 13 ( 4-6 „ ) 



100 „ „ III (39-5 » ) 



150 „ „ 145 (51-9 » ) 



200 „ „ 10 ( 3-5 „ ) 



It is evident that 95 per cent of all the milk which comes into 

 Finsbury from the country must of necessity spend several hours 

 on the railway. From one cause or another this period of transit 

 from farm to milk-shop averages ten to twelve hours. An 

 example will illustrate what actually happens. A certain con- 

 tractor in Finsbury obtains his milk from a number of farms in 

 the Derbyshire and Staffordshire district He possesses a more 

 or less correct list of the farms with which he deals, and a correct 

 list of the milk agents through whom he does his business. He 

 receives between 1000 and 1500 gallons of milk daily, and it is 

 delivered in ordinary milk churns at Euston or St Pancras 

 Stations early in the morning. At R., in Staffordshire, he has 

 an agent who obtains milk from some half-dozen farms within 

 three or four miles of R. railway station. Milking takes place 

 between 4 and 6 P.M., and the milk is strained, and some of it 

 cooled, and placed in churns and sent to R. railway station. The 

 milk undergoes various vicissitudes on the railway (whose company 

 does not provide refrigerator cars for its ordinary milk traffic), and 

 eventually it arrives in London about three or four o'clock in the 

 morning. The milk contractor (with his vans) meets the milk and 

 distributes it, selecting so many churns for this van, and so many 

 for that, and by six in the morning the milk is at the milk-shops 

 in various parts of London. Exactly which milk reaches each milk- 

 shop is not known to the contractor or anybody else. What is known 

 is that it is at least twelve hours old, and some of it eighteen hours 

 old. A certain quantity, sometimes the whole supply, is taken from 

 the railway stations to the depot of the contractor, from which it is 

 distributed to various districts. But in any case it has not yet 

 reached its destination. For much of it is retailed (sometimes twice 

 over) in small quantities to small shops which, whilst selling lamp 



