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177
As to other constituents of milk, the total solids
not fat are much increased in quantity since the
Adulteration Act has been in force. So much has
this been the case that I have been able to raise the
standard of good milk.
I do not think that the standard of 12½ per cent.
of total solids, made up of 3.2 per cent. of butter and
9.3 per cent. of solids not fat, can be considered at all
too high.
Apart from the subject of adulteration, and yet
as a matter of the greatest importance to health, is an
answer to the question, What is milk ? The answer
I venture to give is, that milk comprises the whole of
the secretion thoroughly mixed. At the ordinary
milking-times, milk is not the first stripping or the
last. The first stripping is poor in butter; the last
stripping rich in cream. The mixture constitutes
milk.
The analysis of a milk is a matter quite apart
from a judgment as to freedom from adulteration. A
knowledge of the quantity of water in the milk is
insufficient. The nature of the total solids must also
be ascertained, especially now that sophistication is
so much better understood.