Am,  Jour.  Pharm.  ) 
July,  1920.  ) 
Book  Reviews. 
521 
as  long  as  four  or  five  years  ago,  data  concerning  which  are  available 
in  numerous  official  publications,  both  State  and  National. 
It  would  be  extremely  desirable  to  have  a  chapter  devoted  to 
canned  soups,  and  miscellaneous  canned  products  so  abundantly 
used  nowadays.  Also  more  complete  figures  are  desirable  in  con- 
•nection  with  canned  vegetables  and  fruits,  in  order  to  properly 
interpret  results,  particularly  with  reference  to  relative  proportions 
of  liquids  and  solids. 
Although  the  vitamines  are  not  capable  of  even  approximate 
analytical  determination  at  the  present  time  in  a  practical  way,  it 
is  surprising  that  this  new  and  important  group  of  food  accessories 
is  not  even  mentioned. 
Notwithstanding  these  few  drawbacks,  the  book  is  one  which 
is  indispensable  to  the  practicing  food  analyst  or  food  expert  and 
shouldbeinevery  reference  library  as  well.  C.  H.  LaW. 
Food  Poisoning  and  Food  Infections.  By  William  G. 
Savage. 
This  recently  issued  volume  of  the  valuable  list  of  scientific 
publications,  issued  under  the  name  of  the  "Cambridge  Public 
Health  Series,"  is  both  timely  and  important.  It  contains  241 
pages  and  is  well  indexed.  Food  poisoning  in  the  popular  mind 
and  to  a  certain  extent  even  among  physicians  and  chemists,  has 
been  a  curious  jumble  of  fact  and  fallacy  in  which  the  newspapers 
have  made  bad  matters  worse  by  their  unintelligent  use  of  such 
terms  as  "ptomaine"  and  the  encouragement  of  the  belief  that  it  is 
the  metallic  substances  present  that  usually  cause  the  unfavorable 
symptoms  sometimes  attributed  to  tinned  foods. 
The  chapter  headings  which  give  one  an  intelligent  idea  of  the 
value  and  comprehensiveness  of  the  book  are  as  follows: 
I.  Introductory  and  historical;  2,  food  as  a  vehicle  for  trans- 
mitting bacterial  diseases;  3,  foods  inherently  poisonous;  4,  food 
idiosyncrasy;  5,  the  clinical  and  general  features  of  out  breaks  of 
food  poisoning;  6,  the  Gaertner  group  of  bacteria  in  relation  to  food 
poisoning;  7,  food  poisoning  of  unspecific  bacterial  origin;  8,  certain 
special  kinds  of  food  poisoning;  9,  botulism;  10,  sources  and  methods 
of  infection  in  food  poisoning  outbreaks;  11,  chemical  poisons  in 
food,  unintentionally  introduced;  12,  chemical  poisons  deliberately 
added  to  food;  13,  the  prevention  of  food  poisoning  outbreaks;  14, 
methods  of  investigation  of  food  poisoning  outbreaks. 
Bibliographic  references  are  freely  given.    It  is  strange  that  no 
