Democrat and sentinel. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1853-1866, 1854-07-27
The Murders of the Innocent..

Ii swlil milk factories had existed in Judea
IN the days of Herod, that potentate would
have been spared the trouble of sending arm
ed men over the country to murder the children
and his fame might have come down to these
tunes redoient OF the odor of sanctity instead
OF reeklng with infamy Had ne operated in
alegal manner, our modern poisopers do
his own design would have come quite as near
| success, and Rachel would as certainly have
mourned her children, though without heanino
curses upon the head of the Tetrarch. The
bills ofmortality in this city present a uniform
report from week to week, of sixty per cent
OF the whole number of deaths as occurring
among very young children, and about fifty
percent, under the age oft years, the mark
fixed by Herod for his slaughter 1t were
preposterous to assert that this excessive in
fantile mortality is natural or necessary. 1t
arises from many different causes, all or at
some time or other under human control. and
all the result of ignorance, carelessness, or
willfal vic kedness. OF the varied causes we
propose at present to advert to single one
AT the foot of the Tenth avenue there exists
great distillery of itself an intolerable nuis-
ance, but so strongly intrenched by the wealth
and influence of its proprietors that all efforts
to break it up have failed. 1t has been present
ed by the Grand Jury we believe more than
OuCc, Du1 no law Dteu IOunQ strong enough
to put stop to it; probably because of the
magnitude Of the nuisance as the man who
robs by millions is likely to 20 unpunished
while the ragged piiferer of dollar gets his
full allowance of justice. But it is not in its
immediate filth and stencil that this distillery
is most pernieious. Its ultimate effect, the
substance it produces and sends all over the
city in the form of poisoned milk, is curse
of much more fearful nature
We have heretofore described the premises
the stables, cows, milk and other matters
thereabout: but an official report Just made to
the Health officer by the Sanitary inspector
which We print in another column, is worthy
of attention not so much for new facts as for
recalling those heretofore set forth in Grand
Jury presentments and Police Reports. The
Inspector found in three rows of stables reach
ing from Tenth to Eleventh avenue, more than
fifteen hundred COWS, each one tied in a stall
but thee feet wide, surrounded with filth
painting for air, and nearly all of them in ad-
vanced stages of disease. There cows are fed
exclusively on warm swill, made for the pur-
pose IN the destillery. The Inspector says the
stencil in which the cows live was so potent
that his assistants were forced to quit the
stables for time IN order TO recover from its
sickening effects. These poor diseased amin
ais are Hliiheu Twice d udy, anu the nasty IL
quid that comes from them is doctored with
chalk, burnt sugar and other drugs, until it
has the appearance of good milk and is then
put into wagons labeled ''Westchester County
Milk, " Pure Country Milk, :" and other lying
devices, and sold throughout the city. OF
course, the greater portion of it goes to the
poorer classes, those who through ignorance or
inability cannot be sure of getting real milk.
We take it that no stronger evidence of the
respect of our people for law can be required
than the simple fact that with full knowledge
of the above facts they have neither burned the
distillery nor the stables, nor lynched single
one of the heartless creatures engaged in this
wholesale destruction of children. No words
of condemnation are equal to the enormity OF
their offence. Ifthey were to distribute through
the town solution of prussic acid for Croton
water. the crime would be none the less helm
Gus than the selling of such reeking corruption
under the name of milk. Suppose the fifteen
hundred COWS yield but two quarts each pei
day; more than 20, 600 quarts of the venomous
mixture will be sold weekly. 1t would be safe
20 calculate that from seventy-fve to hundred
children are killed every week by having this
| ''pure country mill" administered to them,
| while hundreds of adults are afflicted with
fevers and scrofulous complaints springing from
| the same cause.