148 
EDITORIAL. 
with indemnification of the owners, by appraisement, proceeds 
systematically under the supervision of the officers of the Bureau. 
For once, perhaps, in the history of contagious pleuro-pneu- 
monia in the United States, means seem to be effectively em¬ 
ployed to stamp out the evil. With good work under the aus¬ 
pices of the General Government, and able assistance from the 
State governments, performed by a corps of competent veterinar¬ 
ians, it may be considered that the days of pleuro-pneumonia in 
the United States are numbered, provided the “ sinews of war ” 
are supplied by the necessary appropriations of money in suffi¬ 
ciently liberal amounts s and that politics, in the guise and form of 
Congressional M.D.’s, can be hindered from allying itself with 
the foe, and is stamped out as resolutely and as promptly as the 
enemy itself ought to be. 
Distillery Milk. —The characteristics of this dietetic ma- 
terial has recently been brought to the attention of the scientific 
and sanitarian public, and our excellent contemporary, Science , 
has instituted a series of inquiries designed to settle the question 
whether swill-fed cows are capable of producing good milk for 
human consumption. The opinions elicited seem to vary as to 
the results of its employment, and while the general verdict seems 
to be adverse, there appears to be a disposition in some observers 
to regard as at least harmless the mode of feeding referred to. 
The following quotations from Science present the opinions of 
* 
three veterinarians, who have had ample opportunities for observ¬ 
ing the effects of a swill diet and the results which follow its use, 
on the quality of the milky secretion : 
[James Law, M.D., Professor of Veterinary Science, Cornell University.] 
Being from home, I cannot profess to answer your questions as to the effects 
of swill-feeding on milk as I could have done had I been beside my library. I 
have been accustomed to see brewers’ and distillers’ grains fed to milch-cows 
without any noticeable evil effect on the milk. If fresh, these are, in the main, 
grain robbed of much of its starch and some of its salts. Even when slightly acid 
from preservation in a closely packed condition, it has not seemed to affect the 
milk injuriously. It is difficult to see how the same material, ground into a fine 
farina, and floating in a large amount of water, can be anymore injurious, further 
than as the excess of the water must produce a relative diminution of the solids in 
the milk. But swill is not always fed in this pure and unchanged condition. As 
preserved for feeding purposes, it is often found to have undergone not an acid 
