294 THE COMMON SENSE OF THE MILK QUESTION 



judge. From one correspondent of good judgment 

 I learn that there has been "considerable improve- 

 ment," while another assures me that "things remain 

 in about the same bad way." This is immaterial, 

 however, for my purpose. I desire simply to use the 

 city as an illustration. Here we have a population 

 of between fifty and sixty thousand, with many cows 

 kept in the city limits by private families, the rest 

 of the milk supply coming from herds kept within a 

 few miles of the city. With no milk inspection, Pro- 

 fessor Doane found that it was quite common for 

 dairymen to water, skim, color, " preserve," and other- 

 wise adulterate their milk. So poor was the milk 

 supply that physicians almost invariably preferred 

 condensed milk for infant feeding, and very few in- 

 fants were fed upon cow's milk. These are, of course, 

 the conditions of a small city at their worst. In such 

 a city, it seems to me, the first need is a campaign of 

 education and the organization of its public-spirited 

 citizens for reform. The establishment of infants' 

 milk depots would seem to be one of its most pressing 

 needs, and I should say that, for some time, it would 

 be necessary to pasteurize the milk supplied by such 

 depots. But, with the sources of supply so near 

 and so easily controllable, pasteurization ought not 

 to be regarded as a permanent condition, but as a 

 temporary expedient. It should be possible to obtain 

 in a very little while a supply of milk for the depots 



