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Society of Medical Officers of Health having drawn up a code (vide
my Annual Report for 1875, page 41), which has been submitted
to the Local Government Board, the " Local Authorities," and
the Sanitary Authorities of the Metropolis, and which will probably
be found to contain all that is necessary. It is to be hoped,
however, that the Board of Works will content themselves with
framing the bye-laws, and will leave the execution of them to the
Vestries and District Boards, the Sanitary Authorities, and their
officers. In the City the same authority will have the duty of
framing and of carrying out the bye-laws, being provided with the
necessary sanitary staff.
But while the advantages of regulating cowsheds and dairies in
Town is undeniable; yet, considering how large a proportion of
the milk supply is obtained from the country, it must be confessed
that any measure that does not provide for the regulation of the
Country Dairies, &c., would be a very imperfect protection to
the Metropolis. It will not be forgotten that the milk that was the
occasion of the great Marylebone Typhoid Fever endemic a few
years ago, was obtained from a dairy many miles distant from
Town, the sanitary condition of which was found and acknowledged
to be simply shocking. Many similar outbreaks due to
insanitary conditions have been placed on record. Only last
year I had occasion to investigate a complaint of numerous cases of
illness clearly due to an impure milk supply, also from the country,
and it was shown that the sanitary arrangements at the farm
were defective, and that the water supply, the immediate cause of
the mischief was as bad as it well could be.
In connection with the subject of cowsheds may be mentioned an
outbreak of Cattle Plague, which took place in 1877. The history
of the outbreak is shortly as follows:—On the 17th of April a cow
in a shed at Ledbury-mews, Notting-hill, was taken ill, and
was removed to a slaughter-house for examination after death,
the supposition being that the animal was affected with " lung
plague " (pleuro-pneumonia). It was found, however, to be suffering
from rinderpest, and the outbreak of the disease having been
reported to the Veterinary Department of the Privy Council, the
shed was declared to be infected, and put under surveillance. Six
days afterwards, on the 23rd April, the remaining twelve cows
were simultaneously attacked, and were killed at the shed : the
carcases were disinfected, and removed in vans to Whitechapel,
there to be reduced to pulp by superheated steam. The premises
and the manure were disinfected, and, in all probability,
the outbreak would have been an isolated one, but for the unfortunate
circumstance that on the opposite side of the mews there
was another shed, in which at the time there were 38 cows. The
distance between the sheds was too small to permit any sanguine
hope that the cattle in the second shed would escape; and, in fact, on