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produces a label which he or a member of his staff swears was attached to
the churn in which the milk came from the dairy farmer, and as this label
bears the words "Pure whole milk," or a similar expression, it is regarded by
the Courts as a warranty, and the warranty is regarded as proved by those
who have sworn to the above statements and have not been contradicted.
It can be proved to be the custom of milk-dealers to dispatch directly from
railway depots part of the milk for distribution without first taking it to their
dairies, and to make use of the milk platforms of railway depots as places for
the handling of milk. This "handling" consists of mixing the milks of
various churns for the purpose of altering the quantities in the churns to
regulate the amount of milk in each churn to be distributed direct or to be
taken to the premises of the milk-dealer to whom the milk was consigned by
the dairy farmer. The Courts will not accept any evidence of this custom,
but require proof of mixing in the case of the particular churn in question
before the Court.
It can also be proved that the labels or warranties are often removed from
the churns on the railway platform, and that the man sent to "handle" milk
will put a number of them indiscriminately into his pocket. It is astonishing
how confidently the man will swear in the witness-box that a particular
warranty label came off a particular churn from a particular dairy farmer.
It is impossible without an enormous staff of Inspectors continuously on
duty night and day at the milk platforms of the railway companies to watch
the adventures of each individual churn in a railway depot.
The defence of warranty by a milk-dealer nearly always succeeds; the
dairy farmer cannot be prosecuted in regard to the same sample, and has no
opportunity of proving his innocence, and therefore the dairy farmer's
reputation is being damaged, and is continuing to be more and more damaged
the more frequently warranties are set up and established.
MILK BELOW THE STANDARD OF THE BOARD OF
AGRICULTURE.
A Sanitary Inspector of Islington took a sample of milk at the premises of
Mr. G., and the Public Analyst for Islington certified the sample as adulterated;
but no prosecution took place because the deficiency was not
considered large enough to lead to conviction.
Mr. G., after his milk had been sampled by the Sanitary Inspector of
Islington, applied to St. Pancras to have a sample taken of each of four
churns delivered at King's Cross Station, Great Northern Railway, on the
14th February, consigned to Mr. G. by Mr. D., a dairy farmer of Staffordshire.
The samples were taken and the Public Analyst certified as follows:—
C. 44. Genuine. 3.16 Fat, 8.54 Solids.
C. 45. The deficiency of milk fat corresponds to the abstraction of
9 percent, of the milk fat.
C. 46. The deficiency in milk fat corresponds to the abstraction of
8 percent, of the milk fat.
C. 47. Genuine. 3.00 Fat, 8.62 Solids.
The Public Health Committee decided to prosecute in the case of the
samples C. 45 and C. 46.