January 28,1871.] THE PHARMACEUTICAL JOURNAL AND TRANSACTIONS. 
G17 
which led to this conviction, hut will content ourselves 
with quoting 1 a description of how the typhoid “ picked 
out, as it were, the customers of this dairy in particular 
streets and rows of houses. Thus, in one long road, and 
a street issuing from it, at a distance of a mile or more 
from the dairy, it supplied three families; of these, two 
had typhoid. It supplied two families in a street with 
about thirty houses; one suffered from typhoid, in the 
other died an old lady from ‘ choleraic diarrhoea.’ It 
supplied four families in a new neighbourhood of about 
seventy houses; three of these families had typhoid. It 
supplied four families in a crescent with twenty-five 
houses ; all four had typhoid (in one only a single mild 
case occurred). It supplied four families in a row of 
nine houses; typhoid occurred in two of them, and in 
the other two, cases of a mild febrile character (not 
■enumerated) occurred. It supplied four families in two 
■opposite rows of houses, altogether about sixty-seven; 
three of them had typhoid happen in them. It supplied 
four families in a square with fifty-nine houses; all four 
had cases of typhoid happen in them, etc. And these 
were, so far as I can ascertain, the only cases in these 
several localities.” 
It is curious to notice how in families that were at¬ 
tacked, women and children, as those who ordinarily 
consume most milk, were the first to suffer. 
“ Thus, in the family living at the cowyard, the 
daughter, while engaged as a nurse in a situation, alone 
got the dairy milk with regularity, and she was the first 
attacked; the second case in this house (her mother) was 
a month later. In a family consisting of the father and 
mother, who never took any milk at any time, two ser¬ 
vants and four children, all had typhoid, except the 
father and mother, the children commencing. In another 
family, consisting of mother, two servants, three girls 
and a hoy of seventeen, one of the girls and the hoy took 
milk porridge daily at breakfast; the other girls, with 
the mother, took little milk comparatively. The ser¬ 
vants, complaining that the beer was sour, asked per¬ 
mission to have milk instead of beer. The girl and boy 
who ate porridge and the two servants were alone at¬ 
tacked. In another family, where a daughter aged 
eighteen and a son aged five years were attacked, the 
daughter, I was told, was a great drinker of milk, and 
she was attacked a fortnight before the son. In a house 
■occupied by several families, using one privy, and where 
the drain-smells from an over-filled cesspool were very 
■offensive, only one elderly man and woman were attacked. 
They alone drank milk from the dairy; the other families, 
being poor, had never any milk at all and altogether 
■escaped. In another family, the only person attacked 
was a young girl, who, being in delicate health, took 
more milk than all the rest of the family. Mr. Clifton 
■also told me of a case of typhoid, which is not enumerated 
here, in the person of a young lady whose family was 
supplied by some other purveyor, but who fancied to 
drink daily a glass of milk from the dairy in question. 
No one else in the house ever took this milk, and she 
alone suffered.” 
It is very significant that those families who lived in 
houses in which local causes of fever existed were the 
first to suffer. 
And now having discovered the vehicle by which the 
fever was spread, and having narrowed the limits of the 
search, Dr. Ballard set to work with fresh zeal. By a 
process of exclusion he eliminated many possible and 
probable causes, and at length was led to the conclusion 
that the source of all the mischief lay in an underground 
water-tank. Upon this tank being exposed, it appeared 
that the wood of which it was made had rotted; and that 
by various rat burrows it was brought into connection 
with two drains, so that it was possible that under cer¬ 
tain circumstances the sewage ran into the tank. The 
•chief difficulty that now arose was the assertion that this 
water was never used to mix with the milk, but only for 
the horses, washing the cans, and general cleaning pur¬ 
poses. Even supposing this to have been the case, there 
would be a small quantity of the foul water left in the 
cans after washing, and considering the small admixture 
of sewage that will poison a well, and the fact that milk 
is a substance which has remarkable relations to chemi¬ 
cal ferments, the author is disposed to think that suffi¬ 
cient of the poison would have existed in it to accoimt 
for what occurred. But we think that it is hardly neces¬ 
sary to fall back upon so slight a cause, as although the 
statement of the family, “that if ever any water was 
added it was from the tap,” might be true as to the rule, 
there may have been exceptions to it in practice, and the 
pump connected with the tank was so situated that it 
could not be seen from the master’s house. At any rate, 
we do not see in what other way the following fact, 
ascertained since the reading of the paper is to be ac¬ 
counted for, as the drainings of the cans would have 
been as likely to affect one sort of milk as the other. 
“ In a street of about fifty villa residences, two of the 
houses only were supplied from the dairy. In only one 
of these did typhoid occur. The family consisted of the 
father and mother ; three boys, aged two, four 1 and five 
years; a baby, aged ten months; two servants and a 
governess. Two kinds of milk were supplied to the 
house from the dairy—namely, ordinary milk at four- 
pence per quart, and ‘ babies’ milk ’ at fivepence. Only 
the baby got the latter. It was better than the ordinary 
milk, as ‘ it threw up more cream.’ It kept well. The 
master of the house, on one occasion before the outbreak, 
had the curiosity to examine the ordinary milk with the 
sp. gr. galactometer, and following the directions accom¬ 
panying the instrument, inferred that one-foui'th of the 
bulk was added water. The youngest boy took most 
milk, but all three boys had bread and milk for break¬ 
fast. The boys and the mother were ill in the country, 
whither the family had gone for their summer trip. 
The youngest boy was the first attacked, on July 17, 
and was taken out of town the next day. The baby re¬ 
mained well, as also did the father, the governess and 
one servant. Of all the family, one servant only re¬ 
mained at home and continued to use the milk. She 
was taken ill about August 1 and had a sharp attack of 
typhoid. At the other house in this street, the part of 
the family at home during June, July and August was 
the father, mother and one servant. At this house 
nothing but ‘ babies’ milk ’ was taken in, the extra 
price being habitually paid. No fever occurred at this 
house.” 
With this quotation we close, having given a brief 
outline of the subject of the pamphlet, but again recom¬ 
mending those of our readers who wish for further details 
to obtain it, and read it for themselves. 
BOOKS RECEIVED. 
Method and Medicine. An Essay. By Balthazar W. 
Foster, M.D. London: Churchills. 1870. 
A Manual of Structural Botany, for the Use of Classes, 
Schools, and Private Students. By M. C. Cooke, M.A. 
With upwards of 200 Illustrations. Third Edition. Lon¬ 
don : Robert Hardwicke. 
The following journals have been received:—The ‘British 
Medical Journal,’ Jan. 21; the ‘ Medical Times and Gazette,’ 
Jan. 21; the ‘Lancet,’ Jan. 21; the ‘Medical Press and Cir¬ 
cular,’Jan. 25; ‘ Nature,’ Jan. 19; the‘Chemical News,’Jan. 
20; ‘Journal of the Society of Arts,’ Jan. 19 ; ‘Gardeners’ 
Chronicle,’ Jan. 21; the ‘Grocer,’ Jan. 21; the ‘Produce 
Markets Review,’ Jan. 21; the ‘ English Mechanic,’ Jan. 20; 
the ‘ Photographic Journal ’ for January; the ‘ Chemists and 
Druggists’ Advocate’ for January; ‘Transactions of the 
Odontological Society’ for January; ‘Proceedings of the 
National Association for the Promotion of Social Science,’ 
Jan. 12; the ‘ Manchester Courier,’ Jan. 19; the ‘Manchester 
Examiner,’Jan. 19; the ‘Ashton Standard,’ Jan. 21; the 
‘Oldham Chronicle,’ Jan. 12. 
