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109
ANALYST'S REPORT.
To the Wandsworth Board of Works.
Gentlemen,
For the purposes of incorporating a record of the
work done in your District under the "Sale of Food and
Drugs Act" with the annual statement of the Medical
Officers of Health, I beg to report as follows:—
(1) As to the Food supply.—During the year ending
April 1st, 1886, I have received from the Inspector
400 samples for analysis. The articles were various
and well selected, and covered all the chief substances
commonly sold by the purveyors of the District. It is
a satisfactory circumstance to record that, of all these
articles, I could only charge 11 as being below the
recognized limits of commercial purity. These 11 articles
were made up as follows:—
Milk 9
Gin 1
Butter 1
11
The excellent effect of your policy of continuous special
inspection is therefore strongly evident in the above
recorded state of the food supply, which maintains, as
heretofore, its high state of purity.
(2) As to the Water supply.— Some few of the
residents in the District still obstinately stick to the use
of wells instead of laying on the Company's water, and,
during the year, I have received and analysed 34 samples
from local pumps. All have been found to be questionable
and some actively dangerous. On this point the public
cannot be too strongly warned that water drawn from a
town soil, perforated in every direction with sewers and
gas pipes, and long since denuded of the bulk of its
natural carbonate of lime, is continually altering in its
nature for the worse, and is a most undesirable source of