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SCIENCE. 



[Vol. X. No. 234 



unhealthy temperature, and no cow that has a persistent temperature 

 of 102" F. can give a wholesome milk. 



The conditions and methods here set forth are those that 

 almost universally prevailed on Long Island when this food was 

 used ; and the milk, which I have analyzed, and which was referred 

 to in previous numbers of this journal, was produced under these 

 conditions. 



The chemical features of the milk which are most marked, are, 

 the strongly acid re-action, deficiency of fat and sugar, and great 

 excess of caseine or curd. So marked were these features, that I 

 was able to identify swill-milk produced under these conditions. 



That such milk is a dangerous food for young children, I have had 

 abundant clinical evidence. The tough, hard curd produced in the 

 stomach by this milk is entirely too much for the digestive powers 

 of even healthy children, and passes undigested, irritating the in- 

 testinal mucous membrane throughout its entire length, giving rise 

 to intestinal catarrh, inflammatory diarrhoea, or cholera-infantum. 

 Occasionally the curd formed in the stomach is too large and firm 

 to pass the pyloris, when the child passes into rapid collapse and 

 death, unable to rid the stomach of the mass either by vomiting or 

 purging. Remedies, under such circumstances, are of no avail. I 

 have seen the same effects, in a somewhat less degree, produced in 

 adults who were not disturbed by a pure, wholesome milk. 



I think we may accept it as demonstrated, ist, that fed as it has 

 always been in this vicinity, distillery-swill is an unfit food for 

 milch-cows, as it deteriorates the health of the cows, and produces 

 unwholesome milk ; 2d, from the difficulty of perfectly controlling 

 the manner of feeding, it is not warrantable for any sanitary au- 

 thority to recommend it as a food for milch-cows ; 3d, it has not 

 yet been proven that it can be successfully fed in conjunction with 

 other wholesome food ; 4th, the laws now in force in this and other 

 States, forbidding the sale of swill-milk, are justifiable, and should 

 be enforced. E. H. Hartley, M.D. 



Brooklyn, Ju'.y 23. 



In answer to yours of the 13th, I have read the papers and re- 

 ports on distillery-swill milk published in Science, and, in my judg- 

 ment, you have furnished reasonable evidence of the unwholesome- 

 ness of such milk as a general fact. I mean where distillery-swill 

 constitutes the chief food of the animals. 



From the veiy nature of the case, complete proof and absolute 

 demonstration by direct, full, and conclusive experiments cannot be 

 had : so we must rely on such evidence as is available, the same as 

 in so many other sanitary questions where the deductions have to be 

 derived from a great mass of cumulative evidence, each single fact 

 in which is inconclusive. I have therefore only to suggest that you 

 continue the recording of facts as the only available way either of 

 arriving at just conclusions or of convincing the public of the truth- 

 fulness of the conclusions. 



I know of no conclusion in sanitation so well established that 

 men may not be found to deny it ; and, so long as distillery-swill 

 milk does not kill or sicken all who may use any of it, there will 

 probably be persons who deny that it is harmful to any. 



The correspondent in Science of July 22 (p. 46) fails to find " posi- 

 tive evidence " of " any ill effects of swill upon cows fed with it." 

 On the other hand, he asserts, as if on " positive evidence," that 

 •" the evils attributable to it are largely, if not entirely, to be ascribed 

 to the unsanitary surroundings of the animals." I hardly know how 

 comprehensive and sweeping he intends this to apply. It would be 

 unfair to charge him with asserting that the almost universal 

 disease in distillery stables, the emaciation, the lax bowels, the loss 

 of teeth, the short lives in such stables as distinguished from those 

 where hay and grain are the chief food, and the " unsanitary sur- 

 roundings of the animals " in these stables, as a rule, should 

 be merely curious coincidences, and not due to the feeding of 

 the swill itself. His language implies all this, but surely I can 

 hardly believe that to be his meaning. 



Some supplementary statements, however, are equally positive 

 and equally striking, — the proposition " that lactation in a dairy is 

 not a normal process," and that he regards the conclusions (if not, 

 indeed, the facts) given by certain chemists and physicians, regard- 

 ing the nature and digestibility of the curd of swill-milk, as on the 

 whole unworthy of confidence. 



If you can convince a few orphan-asylums and foundling-hospitals 



that it would be an innocent and harmless experiment to feed half 

 of their children on distillery-swill milk, and the other on grass-and- 

 grain milk, and continue this experiment for several years, on differ- 

 ent races of children, in different localities, some of the swill-milk 

 stables to be kept as clean as other stables may be, by some process 

 not yet announced, and carefully record and collate all the results, 

 the question would then be settled, in the usual acceptance of that 

 term. 



Until some such plan for " positive evidence " be secured, I sug- 

 gest that you work at the method of cumulative evidence which has 

 been so rich in conclusions and beneficent in its results in other de- 

 partments of sanitary science. Wm. H. Brewer. 



New Haven, Conn., July 25. 



State Interference. 



Copies of Science containing two of the articles on State inter- 

 ference have been received ; also your note asking opinions respect- 

 ing them. 



I am glad you undertook the investigation, and wish it might 

 have called forth more elaborate replies. It is a subject which 

 ought to be worked up carefully for all the States and for a period 

 of years long enough to show the working of tendencies. 



But, so far as the facts you have presented go, I see very little 

 which will not be found upon the statute-books of England, which 

 is generally known as the classic land of laissez faire. The pro- 

 tective system involves more serious interference with private con- 

 cerns than almost any of the new laws. Our legislators, I admit, 

 are ignorant, and moved largely by party or private interest ; but 

 that is the fault of our political system, and is connected with the 

 essentially commercial character of the people. The social ques- 

 tion is upon us : we must have laws regulating competition to a 

 certain extent. The danger comes, not from the tendency toward 

 such regulation, but from the character of the men to whom legis- 

 lation is intrusted : hence the necessity of civil-service reform, of 

 higher political education, and of a strengthening of the moral tone 

 of the people. H. L. OSGOOD. 



Short Beach, Conn., July 23. 



Tornado Force. 



Mr. E. B. Garriatt has a communication on tornado power in 

 your issue of July 22, in which he complains of the " disposition, on 

 the part of writers on scientific subjects, ... to sacrifice com- 

 mon-sense reasoning and probable facts to profound but im- 

 probable theories," and then proceeds to explain tornado energy 

 as due to electricity, and not to wind. To support this view, 

 he makes the statement, first, that " moist air is one of the best 

 known conductors of electricity ; " and, second, that the " earth 

 is the great reservoir for the electric fluid." It might be worth the 

 while for Mr. Garriatt to assure himself of the truth of his funda- 

 mental principles before he applies them on so large a scale. There 

 is not the slightest experimental evidence that moist air is a con- 

 ductor at all, much less " one of the best ; " and as for the earth 

 being a reservoir of electricity, every thing that is known about 

 electricity negatives the idea. 



Again : it is implied that electrical energy is more destructive 

 than other kinds, as if a definite quantity of it could do more work 

 than an equal quantity of other energy. He also speaks of " the 

 electric fluid." These quotations show that he has no practical ac- 

 quaintance with what physicists call ' electricity ; ' that he does not 

 understand the laws of its generation, the conditions of its trans- 

 ferrence, nor its quantitative relation to other forms of energy ; and 

 therefore, to quote still further from his article, it is " unsatisfactory 

 and worthless from a practical scientific standpoint." 



A. E. DOLBEAR. 

 College Hill, Mass., July 23. 



Answers. 



10. Robin's Nest. — The ten-storied robin's nest mentioned in 

 Science of July 22 is indeed a remarkable affair. It is rather unus- 

 ual for robins to build a new nest on an old one, although it some- 

 times happens. I have seen a number of two-storied nests, and 

 one three-storied one, but such nests are rare. J. A. Allen. 



New York, July 26. 



