202 



FOODS AND FOOD ADULTERANTS. 



millet, and is the grain (with an integument, but without the husk) of one of the 

 cereal grasses, Sorghum vulgare. 



It is a roundish or oval somewhat flattened grain, size from one-eighth to one-fifth 

 of an inch in diameter, white in color and brittle, with a thin, smooth integument or 

 testa, showing under a high microscopic power, on the inner surface, an aggregation 

 of very small granules, which become blue by iodine. The body of the seed is very 

 white, and consists mainly of roundish or irregular starch granules, varying in size 

 from .0001 up to .0006 of an inch in diameter, and showing under polarized light a 

 nearly right-angled cross ; and of larger irregularly rounded granules of starch from 

 .0005 up to .0013 of an inch in diameter, showing no cross, or only a very faint one, 

 under polarized light. 



Some of the first-named granules have a hilum and star in the centre, somewhat 

 like bean starch. By boiling with caustic alkali the cellular membrane which binds 

 the starch granules together is disclosed. 



The influence of an admixture of sorghum with pepper upon analysis of the latter 

 will be seen from the following analysis of sorghum grains : 



Moisture 11 per cent. 



Composition of Ike dried sample. 



There would be no difficulty in detecting it. 



Although as yet these substances do not seem to have reached us as 

 far as the samples which we have examined show they must be care- 

 fully watched for. 



In this country considerable has been published as to the adulterations 

 of pepper, but little in regard to the manner of detecting them. We 

 have already spoken of the large numbers of samples which have been 

 examined in different years by the public analysts of Canada and smaller 

 numbers by those of Massachusetts and New York. Reference to the 

 reports of the department of inland revenue of the Dominion (supple- 

 ments on adulteration of food) shows th at wheat flour, husks, cayenne, 

 coacoanut shells, and pepper dust, nulling refuse, pea meal, and sand 

 and clay are in very common use. In the United States the samples 

 examined have apparently proved no better, for while in Canada in 1885 

 twenty -nine out of sixty samples were adulterated mostly from 10 to 20 

 percent., but reaching 75 per cent.; in New York in 1882, out of forty- 

 seven, thirty- three were adulterated, and in Massachusetts in 1884 Wood 

 found one hundred and four in one hundred and ninety-nine impure, 

 and in 1883 G9 to 70 per cent, were bad. 



We are thus supplied with considerable experience in the examina- 

 tion of peppers, the results of which furnish the basis of a scheme for 

 general use. Thus in examining a sample 1 should propose to proceed 

 as follows : 



