ILLINOIS DAIRYMEN'S ASSOCIATION 115 



the germs which form the lactic acid but does not kill the germs 

 that produce either the ptomaines or the other poisons, deleterious 

 if not fatal. Milk to be used for children must be kept pure from 

 the outset. The causes of chronic or temporary diarrhoea in 

 children are to be found usually in the milk supply. They do 

 not exist in the milk if infection is carefully and persistently 

 excluded from the outset, but if the spore forming germs are 

 allowed access to the milk and are allowed to multiply there for 

 three or four hours they produce substances from their own ac- 

 tivity which are injurious and the injuries are neither cured or 

 excluded by pasteurization. The recent work in New York on 

 a question of this kind is intensely interesting on this point. It 

 was shown by those young doctors that the care of the child had 

 more to do with its health than the quality of the milk supply. 

 The number of cases of summer diarrhoea fell off as soon as pure 

 milk was given in place of a defective article. Pasteurization 

 to be effective must be repeated for at least three days to kill the 

 germs which germinate between the treatments and to make the 

 milk safe must be clone for the first time very soon after the 

 milking. I repeat the statement that milk 24 to 06 hours old is 

 an unsafe article of diet for children, unless it was kept scrupu- 

 lously clean from the outset. Let us remember that because milk 

 does not sour it is not proven that the milk is fit food for children. 

 One further point and I am done. We have heard some- 

 thing at this convention about the necessity of keeping the udders 

 of the cow clean. Some recent experiments at the Cornell 

 University go to show that if a cow has to drag her udder 

 through mire and filth on her way to the stable and is then 

 allowed to stand until the material dries on the udder, the milk 

 duct becomes infected wMi bad germs which may even work their 

 way to the milk cistern, there to propogate and to infect the milk 

 of an indefinite number of messes in the future. Too much care 

 cannot be exercised therefore in keeping the environs of the 

 stable thoroughly clean. 



