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17
I am happy to be able to state that, speaking generally, I
find employers perfectly willing to conform to the regulations
imposed upon them. When I have to call attention to any
breach or omission, I frequently receive a ready promise of
immediate attention, which renders formal notice unnecessary.
In evidence of this, I would call attention to the large number
of nuisances abated in excess of the written notices served.
PUBLIC CONVENIENCES.
In obedience to your instructions, I have, during the year,
inspected twice or thrice weekly each of the Women's Public
Conveniences. I have invariably found these places clean and
well kept by the attendants. I have been able to suggest a
few trifling alterations, which were in each case sanctioned by
the late Vestry.
I beg to remain, Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
L. MARGUERITE O'KELL,
Sanitary Inspector.
SALE OF FOOD AND DRUGS ACTS.
A full list of substances analysed under the Sale of Food
and Drugs Acts is given in table II. It will be seen by that table
that out of 639 samples only eight were reported against. Of
the eight, five samples were milk, the samples being either
diluted with water or deprived of cream, or both.
In November the attention of the whole country was
directed to possible poisonous contamination of beer. 15
samples, taken by the various Inspectors from different parts
of the Parish, were analysed, but found to contain no arsenic.
A large number of samples of beer have been examined since,
and although the results belong to the present year (1901), it
may be well to state that no arsenic as yet has been found.
In a work published in 1879*, the writer distinctly pointed
out the possibility of beer becoming contaminated by arsenic
*A Manual of Practical Chemistry, "The Analysis of Foods and the
Detection of Poisons," p. 169, by A. Wynter Blyth, Lond., 1879. The subsequent
editions of this work appeared in two volumes, the one devoted to foods, the other
to poisons. In the article on "Beer" the statement relative to arsenical glucose
was repeated in each edition.