16  Candy — Cheap  and  Expensive.        {A jauuTry  191™' 
can  be  sold  so  cheaply  and  equal  astonishment  at  the  fact  that  it 
can  be  made  to  cost  so  much.  Both  sets  of  critics  overlook  several 
important  facts  which  are  easily  apparent  to  the  reasoning  indi- 
vidual. About  the  cheapest  price  at  which  good  candy  can  be  sold 
at  retail  to  afford  even  a  small  margin  of  profit,  is  8  or  10  cents  a 
pound.  Such  candy  can  be  and  usually  is  pure  and  wholesome,  as 
in  it  are  used  only  sugar  or  molasses,  glucose,  flavors  and  colors, 
the  total  cost  of  which  to  the  manufacturer  will  not  aggregate  more 
than  6  or  7  cents  a  pound,  and  as  all  candy  contains  more  moisture 
(added  in  its  preparation )  than  is  naturally  present  in  the  ingre- 
dients, another  element  of  profit,  usually  overlooked,  is  apparent. 
When  we  consider  the  higher  priced  candies  and  the  causes  for 
their  high  prices,  we  find  that  not  only  is  the  labor  expended  upon 
them  much  greater  in  proportion  (many  of  them  being  made  en- 
tirely by  hand  while  the  cheaper  candies  are  made  altogether  by 
machinery),  but  that  expensive  ingredients  such  as  nuts,  chocolate, 
fruits,  etc.,  are  freely  used,  thus  accounting  for  much  of  their  in- 
creased cost. 
At  the  present  time  it  may  be  confidently  stated,  I  believe,  that 
candy  is  more  rarely  adulterated  than  ever  in  its  history.  In  the 
Federal  Food  and  Drugs  Act  of  June  30,  1906,  the  following  specific 
clause  is  directed  toward  candy :  "  A  substance  shall  be  deemed  to 
be  adulterated  :  In  the  case  of  confectionery :  If  it  contains  terra 
alba,  barytes,  talc,  chrome  yellow,  or  other  mineral  substance  or 
poisonous  color  or  flavor  or  other  ingredient  deleterious  or  detri- 
mental to  health,  or  any  vinous,  malt  or  spirituous  liquor  or  com-' 
pound  or  narcotic  drug."  We  here  see  a  specific  prohibition  of  a 
number  of  substances  by  name.  Terra  alba  is  a  synonym  for 
powdered  gypsum,  a  pulverized  rock  resembling  plaster  of  Paris; 
barytes  is  another  mineral  substance,  very  heavy  and  insoluble, 
used  principally  as  a  filler  in  paper  manufacture  or  as  a  white  pig- 
ment :  talc  is  powdered  soapstone,  the  substance  commonly  used  as 
a  toilet  powder ;  chrome  yellow  is  a  poisonous  compound  of  lead 
used  as  a  pigment.  None  of  these,  with  the  exception  of  talc,  which 
has  been  reported  in  small  quantities  in  certain  candies  like  jelly 
beans  where  it  is  used  as  a  polishing  agent,  has  been  reported  as  a 
candy  adulterant  for  years.  The  manufacturers  of  candy  them- 
selves have,  through  their  trade  organizations,  brought  about  a 
cessation  of  trade  practices  which  were  in  vogue  some  years  ago 
and  which  were  undoubtedly  harmful.    Even  before  the  publishing 
