124 
HOUSEHOLD BACTERIOLOGY 
ing jelly for the juice. In this the bacteria flourished 
better than the molds. One of the gardens which she 
tried was turned to liquid in a week. 
She was fortunate to receive from a bacteriologist a 
pure culture of b. prodigiosus or the “miracle germ.” 
This she planted in the yolk of a hard-boiled egg and 
in a week it had transformed the yolk to a red mass 
mingled with much liquid. This was well covered and 
kept in darkness. She one day found that the hecto¬ 
graph had become a garden of molds and bacteria. 
Under the right conditions it might have been lique¬ 
fied. 
That childen can be readily taught by observation 
is shown by a report from the same teacher. A girl 
insisted that her hands were clean, but a tablespoon 
of the water in which she washed her clean hands 
when introduced into milk proved an efficient aid in its 
putrefaction. “The cooking class never forgot to 
wash their hands.” 
A class of farmers’ daughters found many sugges¬ 
tions for their future care of milk products from va¬ 
rious experiments in the cultivation in milk of the dif¬ 
ferent species which turn it sour, putrid, bitter, etc. 
Such reports as these should stimulate other teach¬ 
ers to interest, to instruct, to educate, by similar ex¬ 
periments, the children under their care. Anything 
which will raise the standard of personal cleanness or 
that of food supplies and general house conditions will 
tend toward health and greater economy. 
