CHAPTER VI. 

 FOODS AND DRUGS AND THEIR ADULTERANTS. 



I. Microscopical Examination of Foods and Drugs. — 



In the examination of foods and drugs for the detection of 

 adulterants the microscope is of very great value; and 

 in many cases it furnishes the only satisfactory method of 

 analysis. Mr. A. E. Leach says, in his treatise on "Food 

 Inspection and Analysis": "The chemical constants of 

 many of the adulterants of coffee and the spices do not 

 always differ sufficiently from those of the pure foods in 

 which they appear to be distinguished therefrom with 

 accuracy and confidence by a chemical analysis alone. 

 On the other hand, one who is familiar with the appear- 

 ance under the microscope of 'the pure foods, and of the 

 starches and various ground substances used as adulter- 

 ants, can with certainty identify very minute quantities 

 of these materials, when present, with the same ease that 

 one can recognize megascopically the most familiar ob- 

 jects about him." 



The starches, already treated in Chapter V, furnish 

 perhaps the best examples of a case in which foreign 

 materials present may be readily detected under the 



microscope. The identification of such substances as 



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