764 
sold here, have not yet been officially published. The results of the 
work done by the Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service during 
the summer of 1906, in connection with its investigation into the cause 
of the undue prevalence of typhoid fever, appear at length in one of 
the recent bulletins published by that service.® All that is of general 
interest of the report of the conference called by the Commissioners 
of the District on March 30, 1907, to determine what should be done 
to improve the milk supply has been printed in certain circulars 
lately issued by the Department of Agriculture.^ As valuable as this 
work has been, yet, in view of what has already been published con- 
cerning it and in view of the probable issue of further bulletins relat- 
ing thereto, all of which are or will be available to those interested in 
the subject, it does not seem expedient to give any detailed account 
of it here. 
It could not be expected that with any reasonably rigid enforce- 
ment of the laws and regulations relating to the production and sale 
of milk, and the manufacture and sale of foods generally, over any 
considerable period, questions of construction would not arise and be 
submitted to the courts for adjudication. The first case that seems to 
be at all material to the purposes of this report is District of Colum- 
bia V. Lynham,® decided February 7, 1900. The case arose under the 
provisions of an act relating to the adulteration of foods and drugs 
in the District of Columbia, approved February 17, 1898,"^ and the 
particular question submitted for decision was whether the defendant, 
a druggist, charged with the sale of a drug adulterated within the 
meaning of the act, was entitled to acquittal upon showing that he 
was at the time of sale ignorant of the composition of the substance 
sold. The court says : 
In the trial of a prosecution under this statute it is incumbent upon the Dis- 
trict of Columbia, in whose name the prosecution is conducted, to prove the sale 
and delivery of the medicine or drug by the defendant, or his possession thereof 
for purpose of sale, and that the same was adulterated within the meaning of 
the statute. The prosecution upon such proof makes out a prima facie case of 
guilt against the defendant; and it is no defense for the defendant to show 
simply that he was at the time of sale, or of possession for sale, ignorant of the 
fact of such adulteration of the drug or medicine. He must know what he sells, 
or proposes to sell, and that it conforms to the standard prescribed by law. As 
a registered druggist, he holds himself out to the public as being sufficiently 
skilled to know and understand of what constituents or ingredients the drugs 
and medicines that he offers for sale are composed, and especially in respect to 
all such drugs and medicines as are recognized and described in the Pharma- 
“ Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service, Hygienic. Laboratory. Bulletin 
No. 35. February, 1907. 
^ Bureau of Animal Industry, Circular 111, issued June 22, 1907. Circular 114, , 
issued August 20, 1907. 
^ 16 Appeals, D. C., 185. 
<^30 Stats., 246. 
