154 THE COMMON SENSE OF THE MILK QUESTION 



ing among infants fed upon cow's milk, — there would 

 be general consternation and alarm. But should a 

 hundred babies die of diarrhoeal diseases in the same 

 city the fact would pass almost unnoticed, even though 

 the hundred deaths could.be as surely ascribed to 

 cow's milk as the ten cases of anthrax. Mr. Nathan 

 Straus says truly: "When a few cases of cholera find 

 their way into one of our ports, there is a great out- 

 burst of public excitement, and money is lavishly 

 spent to ward off the danger. Yet there is eminent 

 authority for the statement that there are more 

 deaths from the preventable diseases of children 

 occurring each year in any city in this country than 

 the total number of deaths caused by Asiatic cholera, 

 in the same city, from the first visitation of Asiatic 

 cholera to the last" * — that is to say, during a period 

 of nearly seventy-five years. 



It is a weU-known fact that in this country, not- 

 withstanding all our boasted progress, one-third of 

 all the babies born die before they reach the age of 

 five years. Suppose, then, that one could mass all 

 the infants in the country on a given date in one vast 

 throng, and then go through the throng selecting 

 the victims destined to die within the five-year period. , 

 Taking the first and second and setting them aside,, 

 one might say: "You may have your chance to live; 

 your chance to run all the dangers which mock our 

 civilization. Live long, if you can." And then, tak- 



