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Food and Drugs Acts. Two hundred and eleven samples have
been taken under the provisions of the Sale of Food and Drugs Acts,
of which 33 have been certified by the Analyst to be adulterated,
and 178 to be genuine. This gives a percentage of adulterated
samples equal to 16 per cent., which compares very unfavourably
indeed with the average percentage adulteration in the Metropolis
generally, wherein the figures were 11.4 in 1901 and 9.8 in 1900.
This large number of adulterated samples also does not by any
means give the total number of samples purchased which were
adulterated, for it has frequently happened that a purchase has
been made, say of coffee, and all the technicalities gone through
at the time of purchase, as to division of samples, &c., and then
on examining carefully the wrapper in which the coffee was
delivered to the purchaser, one finds that it bears the mystic
words, "This is sold as a mixture," or something of similar
import, by which means, in the eye of the law, a sufficient declar-
ation as to the sophistication of the contents has been made to
the purchaser. Accordingly, it is no use proceeding further with
such a sample by submitting it to the Public Analyst, and hence
it does not appear in the above figures in any way.
The number of samples of milk adulterated works out at 17
per cent., thus shewing that milk, which is so readily adulterated,
and at very little expense to the vendor, still continues to be
tampered with to an alarming extent.
The standard fixed by the Board of Agriculture as to the
contents of what is presumed to be pure milk, certainly in my
opinion, does not err in any way on account of its stringency, for
whereas the Board's standard is: total solids, 11.5 per cent.; fat,
3 per cent.; solids not fat, 8.5 per cent., the average quality of