Milk.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XI, Issue 1625, 3 February 1886, Page 2

Milk.

The following synopsis, bytheSariitarian, of a paper, by Dr Dougall, of Glascow, detailing experiments conducted with a view to discovering the absorptive power of milk on various volatile substances, will be of interest. Dr Dougall enclosed m a jar a portion of certain substances giving off emanations, together with a uniform quantity of milk, for a period of eight hours. At the end of that time a sample of milk was drawn by means of a pipette from the lowest stratum of the vessel exposed m the jar; and we find that the following were the results ©fhis experiments :— -• . . ;-«", Smell m Milk. J~S ° al f •-:, ~ *" distin «fr 2 — Puraffine oil strong 3— Turpentine ... ... ver y gtronj 4— Onions ...very strong s— Tobacco smoke Yeiy^ronr 6— Ammonia... ... ... moderate 7 — Musk faint 8-Asafcetida ... ... distinct 9-Stale urine ... „. x fe mt 10— Creosote ... . strong 11— Cheese (stale) distinct }2-Chlorotorm moderate 13-gutnd_fish ... ... y OT y bad 14-Camphor ... ... moderate 15— Decayed cabbage ... distinct ; It thus becomes obvious that the milk has absorbed the emanations of all the suMancesto which it had been exposed and it further : transpired that Lall Vtho specimens examined retained their distinctive odours for as long >-as fourteen hours after their removal f rom the glass jar m which they had been exposed. Cream, according to Dr Doagall, m»y be regarded as acting m much the lame manner as milk ; indeed, although it contains less water than milk, yet it hag special qualties ot its own, which may perhaps make it even more liable to retain offensiye and dangerous emanations than the parent fluid itself. Abundant evidence has, however, been given to show that far more care is needed m connection with the storage of milk than has heretofore been regarded as^ necessary, and this especially where milk io» cream is kept m apartments or wards occupied bj sick persons. If the eiminations to which the milk is exposed are of a diseased and dangerous quality, it is all but impossible that the sample can remain free from offensive and dangerous properties, and it should become an invariable rule to keep as* little milk as possible m sick rooms, and never to allow a supply which has thus been exposed to unwholesome emanations to be used for food. Under these circumstances it has been lately held desirable to boil all milk which is open to suspicion before using it. In the course of several epidemics m which milk has acted as the vehicle of infection, it has been noticed .that persons who had only consumed it after it had been boiled escaped all ill results whereas other members of the same family or community who had not taken that precaution had been attacked with disease.