The Akaroa Mail.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 506, 20 May 1881, Page 2

The Akaroa Mail.

Pill DAY, MAY 2i"

From the American Trade Journal •, published March 16, in Chicago we make the following extracts. The remarks extracted ofcur in a powerfully written article on the subject of the nefarious practices pursued in the provision trade of adulterating articles of everyday; consumption, wit i indigestible.and unwholesome rubbish :_=:-■•"- ---' ■ '"' '.■ -■ i •■

Formerly the work of adulteration and counterfeiting was carried on in: secret, and the operators took every, precaution against detection. Now .the manufacturers of the, yile compounds known, as butterine, oleomargarine, suine, etc., tnke particular pains to advertise the millions of pounds they manufacture, and publicly boast that they so complelely counterfeit the genuine article, that even an expert cannot detect'it. 'Largo manufactories are elaborately illustrated and described in the leading papers of the day, and scientific descriptions of the chemical and mechanical methods cf purifying the disgusting offal of slaughter houses are written and published in scientific journals and the daily press at a dollar a line, together with scientific disquisitions on the inocnousness of such ingredients when purified by poisonous and deadly acids. * * * *

Nor is this crime of adulteration, confined to the large cities, It is stated that an entire soap stone or steatite quarry in one of the Eastern States is being ground into a fine, flour like substance, by an enterprising firm, and distributed, throughout the country to farmers, dairymen and butter dealers, as an adulterant for batter. Thousands upon thousands oi ; circulars are sent out to this class of producers, offering to furnish the adulterant at one cent per lb, and assuring them that it can be used to the extent of 25, 50 or even 75 per cent in butter, without fear of detection, It was stilted at the late meeting , of the National Butter Cheese & Egg Association, at Cedar llapids, lowa, that a consignment of five tons ot this stuff had recently been received by a butter commission merchant in a small town of Western lovvii, and a commiUee was appointed to invesiigate the matter. This, of course, is but one of the many orders that have been sent to country towns, for we are assured that hundreds of tons of this stone have been ground np and disposed of.

The effects of these dishonest pi'act'ees are'far-reaching , , as well as immediately injurious. The temptation to increase the sale of these counterfeits and adulterated articles by putting them on foreign markets, is not to be resisted by those, who have thus acquired a tnste for dishonest gains. Large quantities of them havebeen exported as American' butter, and in various foreign markets the fraud has already been detected, and has creat:d a prejiv.lico against the real American product, and the effect- has been that the demand in foreign markets for American butter and cheese has already fallen off to the extent of millions of dollars, and the cud is not yet. Jt would not be strange nor could we complain, if every European country should prohibit the importation of the&e articles of American manufacture entirely, as the most ready means of relieving themselves from the dangerous and worth less counterfeit and adulterated stutt". Thus the entire foreign commerce of the country may suffer to a fearful extent, that a few dishonest men may euricli themselves by their skill in producing counterfeit articles of tood.

The latter part oi these extracts lias an immediate interest for us. We have not yet reached the pitch of cleverness and rascality combined which would prompt us to adulterate our provisions for export. There is, however, a danger lest a prejudice maybe created against our products, if wo are not careful of the quality of the goods shipped. At the same time our producers may console shemselves with the thought that "itis an ill wind, etc." Their great rival in the European market for dairy produce has been America. If the productions of that country, therefore, lie under suspicion through the prevalence of adulteration, the field will be to a certain extent cleared for the reception of dairy produce from Now Zealand. Lot our farmers take care to allow nothing bur a first class article to leave these shores, and th-y will all benefit by the good name acquired by New Zealand, just as America has suffered by the dishonest practices- of .some.of her unprincipled men of business.

A WOMAN recently went to church with two bonn"ta on her head—one stuck inside the other—and the other women in the congregation almost died of envy They thought it was a new kind of bonnetand too sweet for anything, ,