68 
HOUSEHOLD BACTERIOLOGY 
Common 
Methods 
the persons using the milk ; therefore, in most cases, 
such additions are contrary to law. 
PRESERVING FOOD 
The following from the U. S. government bulletin 
on ‘The Use and Abuse of Food Preservatives/’ will 
show us that man has always sought to prevent x the 
use of his food by these micro-organisms: 
“In hot, arid regions the question of the preservation 
of food is of little interest. An animal may be slain 
and its carcass hung in the air to dry. Other foods 
keep correspondingly well. Putrefaction and decay 
are almost unknown. On the other hand, wherever 
climatic conditions favor decay this question becomes 
important, especially for those who live at a distance 
from markets and who kill and preserve their own 
meat, and for those who, either on land or sea, are 
for a number of days remote from a source of supply. 
“The methods most commonly employed for pre¬ 
serving food, by drying and smoking and with salt, 
vinegar, alcohol, and sugar, have long been known. 
Some of them are probably as old as civilization itself, 
and indeed are not unknown to many tribes of savages. 
We are told by Herodotus that the ancient Egyptians 
were conversant with the art of preserving meat with 
salt, and six centuries before the Christian era Cyrus 
sustained his troops on long expeditions with salted 
meat. The aborigines of North and South America 
were accustomed to cure their meat by smoking or 
“jerking” (tearing from the bone in long strips and 
