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every kind of provision and grocery is sold, and in many cases
spices, soap, wood, paraffin oil, blacking, etc., are also sold. This,
therefore, is the great dividing line between these milk shops, and,
as a general rule, it may be said that the dairies sell most milk
(about 60 per cent, of the total) and are managed in a more satisfactory
and cleanly manner than the general shops. It is, of course,
evident that it is impossible to manage a general provision shop,
selling all sorts of miscellaneous materials, in a cleanly way. Hence
it comes about, that most of these general shops are open to
criticism from the point of view of a pure milk supply. Several
matters of importance respecting the 221 milk shops may now be
briefly considered :—
Milk Storage.—When the milk arrives from the farm, or
from the contractor, which it generally does, as we have seen, in
the early morning, it is necessary to store it on the milk shop
premises. Such milk may be stored for two or three hours only, or
for 24 hours or more. In 35 shops (or 16 per cent.) it is stored in the
churns in which it arrives, or in special vessels kept for the purpose,
and protected in a greater or lesser measure from pollution. In 186
(or 84 per cent, of the total milk shops in the Borough) the milk is
at once placed in the counter pan (metal or earthenware) in the
shop. As every one knows, these counter pans are exposed in the
shop and dipped into whenever a customer requires serving with
milk. Commonly, such pans will contain from 2-4 gallons of milk,
and this is the store which will last, more or less, throughout the day.
As a rule, these pans and the other utensils used in the Finsbury
milk shops are fairly clean ; but as the day goes by it is found that
dirt collects in the pan and on the milk owing to the fact that, as a
rule, the pans are not covered. Two years ago instructions were
given that everyone of these pans was to be covered, and many of
the milk sellers provided themselves with muslin covers, paper
frames or metal lids. Now we found by inspection that in 161
shops no cover at all was being used. That is to say, that 73 per
cent, of the milk sellers do not take the most simple and elementary
precaution to keep their milk from becoming polluted. It cannot be
too strongly emphasised that milk becomes contaminated in milk
shops, because it is not sufficiently protected. Such contamination
arises from three sources :—