xxT PROCEDURES TO OBTAIN PURE MILK 399 



£4. Obviously milk adulteration is very profitable, while 

 milk toning, if less lucrative, is safer and as remunerative in 

 the end. 



As showing that the present low standard is appreciated 

 by the fraudulent milk seller the Annual Eeport of the Local 

 Government Board for 1908-1909 may be quoted. 45,093 

 samples of milk were analysed during the year, and 4738, or 

 10"5 per cent, was reported as adulterated, or as failing to 

 reach the minimal limits fixed by the Sale of Milk Eegulations, 

 1901. In the four years 1905-1908 the proportion of milk 

 samples reported as adulterated in England and Wales has 

 three times been 10'5 per cent. The Eeport states that while 

 the systematic milk adulteration practised thirty years ago has 

 practically disappeared, judging by the numbers of samples 

 which are reported as " poor," " very poor," or as just reaching 

 the legal limit of 3 per cent fat, all of which have to be 

 returned as genuine, the practice of robbing good milk of a 

 large proportion of its cream, so that it may just escape 

 condemnation by the public analyst, is on the increase. 



A firm of milk and cream contractors lately represented 

 to the Board that a systematic practice is growing up in the 

 South and West of England of " toning " milk before it is 

 despatched to London and other large towns. " Toning " 

 consists of reducing the quality of milk so that it barely 

 complies with the minimum limits prescribed by the Sale of 

 Milk- Eegulations. The firm states that samples taken in 

 December 1908, without notice, of the milk sent by nine 

 farmers to one of their depots showed that the average fat in 

 the morning and evening milks was 4^08 per cent, and that 

 a large illicit profit can be made without risk when milk is 

 thus systematically impoverished. Commenting on this, the 

 Eeport observes : 



Some magistrates appear to consider the limit for fat fixed by 

 the regulations as representing milk of average quality, and regard 

 all milk coming within 5 or 10 per cent of that limit as passable. 

 It must, however, be remembered that milk of good average quality 

 contains more nearly 3i per cent of fat than the 3 per cent which 

 has been fixed for the purpose of the regulations referred to. 



The extensive prevalence of milk toning is also shown by 

 the fact that the percentage of fat and solids found in ordinary 



