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there anything superficially suggestive of impurity. Water
from this tank was used for miscellaneous purposes, among
which the washing of carts and trucks played an important
part. Into this water, pails from the stables and cowhouse,
encrusted with filth, and brushes used for spoke washing,
were dipped and re-dipped. This process could not take
place and be continued without the water contained in the
tank becoming largely polluted from filth introduced by the
articles submerged—and filth gathering on the wheels of
carts and trucks in transit would come from many sources.
When the tank was emptied on April 3rd, four inches of
offensive smelling deposit was found accumulated beneath
the water.
As the liquid contents of this tank were usually kept
warm by heat radiating from the boiler situated in close
proximity, they would constitute a very efficient incubator
and breeding ground for microscopic organisms. From
what we know of the life history of the Typhoid Bacillus,
we may be satisfied that this medium would be congenial
to its growth and development. That the Typhoid Bacillus
might have been introduced is by no means an improbable
supposition when we consider the various sources from
which this water was known to suffer contamination.
Moreover, removed only by the space of a few feet from the
base of the tank was the orifice of a yard drain, the trap of
which had been broken, and impregnation of the water
might even have taken place from rising sewer air. Contained,
then, in this tank was practically a sewage-polluted
water—a water capable, when mixed with milk, of generating
Typhoid in the consumer.
The final question might now be asked as to how this
polluted water found its way into the churns, but to that
question I shall not offer any answer. I only show the