Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1886-02-19
Agricultural.


Inv HN"@N'
Oleomargarine is rich vein for politicians
aud city editors to work for the farmers pat
ronage, and It is worked up by this interest
to an evil of such huge magnitude that the
total prohibition Of the manufacture of any
substitute for genuine milk butter would seem
TO be the only way to save the dairy from an
Inhalation. But the courts will not sustain
law prohibiting the manufacture or sale Of
any article Of food not known to be unwhole-
some. This is shown by the fate of the anti
oleomargarine law in New York, and the prin'
ciple embodied in the decision of the supreme
court Of that state will doubtless be sustained
wherever the courts pass upon similar law.
We do not share the exaggerated fears of the
many takers and writers who predict the
ruin Of the dairy business from the competi-
ton of imitation products. However large
the manufacture and sale of these substi-
tutes may be, there is no danger that COWS
will be superseded In fact, more than 80
per cent of all the material used in making
what is called bogus butter comes, either di-
rectly or indirectly, from the dairy and
probably more than 95 per cent Of the whole
is direct product OF the farm.
Under the head, ''What Bogus Butter is
Made or" the newspapers are publishing an
absurd congomerate list of drugs, medi-
cines, paints, oils and dyestuHs, " to the num-
Der of half hundred, which the New Eng
land Homestead vouches for as being taken
from the record Of II patents for making ar
tificial butter According to this authority,
bogus butter is made Of sugar Of lead, BIZ
sulphate OF lime saltpeter, boraX, boracic
acid, sslicylic acid orris root, cotton-seed oil,
vegetable oils bitarc acid, bicarbonate OF
Soda nitrate of potassa, glycerine, capsylic
acid, cuparic acid, alum, capsic acid, sulphite
of soda, cows udder, commercial sulphuric
acid, pepsin, sal soda, tallow, lard, sea salt
farinsceous flour, butyric ether caustic pot
ash, carbonic acid, suphurio acid, castor oil,
chalk, slippery elm bark, caul, oil Of sesame
oil of sunhower seeds, olive oil, curcumine
turnip- seed oil, broma chloralum, cblorate Of
potash nitre, oil of sweet Almonds oil Of pea
nuts, peroxide of manganese, stomach o.
pigs, sheep or calf, nitrate of soda, bennit
OIL gastric juice, mustard seed oil, nitric acid
dry blood slbumen, sugar, butyric acid bi
carbonate Of potash, chloride of sodium
caustic soda, corn starch, coloring matter"
This proves rather too much, especially fo
any one having some knowledge of chemis
try though, possibly, DIR. Hoskins account
for it in the quotation which we make below
from the Waterman
"When we consider how many cranks tax
out patents for utterly worthless things-fo
processes that will not work and machine
that will not operate-it is not improbabl
that every one of these things (and why NO
thousand others) may have been proposed
for use in making artificial butter But tn
real questions should be Are they used
Are these substances, good, bad and indiifel
ent, actually to be found in the artificial bui
ters offered for sale 2"
For ourselves, we should expect an analyst
to show, of nearly all the artificial butter this
is made, a very small per cent differing matt
rally in chemical composition from genuin
butter but if poisons or substances know
to be injurious to health are actually cou
pounded with any article of food, and offere
for sale, the penalty of the law cnn hardly /
too severe Farther than this, the law of We
mont provides all that can reasonably be asl
ed-that "a person who knowingly sells
offers for sale, as butter, any oleomargarn
butterine, or article or substance resemblir
butter and not made exclusively from milk
cream, and of which the oil or fat of animal
not produced from milk, is component par
shall, for each such offense, be fined $500
and on trial for such offense proof of the sa
or offer for sale shall be prima tdcie eviden
of knowledge" Half of the penalty goes
the complainant. 1t will be seen that Il
penalty is only for the sale, or offer for sal
under fraudulent name.
DIR. Hoskins hits squsrey on the head Il
only two nails that need be driven when
says that "there are good and ample groun
to demand that the manufacture of any fo'
product offered for sale in the public marke
should be placed under strict police super
sion, because the public health demands
The imitation butter Gas we'll as the genui
article comes under this head, and all citize
(not farmers only, or chief are vitality int
ested in the enactment of proper legslatio
and in its effective enforcement, in order Ii
nothing of an injurious nature should be sc
for food. And it also goes without sayi
that our government owes TO the dairy int
est in which so much capital is invested, Ii
no imitation of dairy products shall be al
where sold, or offered for sale, as a genui
article. This, and this only, is what the
telligent dairymen of the country demar
and it is what they could easily get if tn
would-be advocates. who claim to represt
them before the public and the law. maxi
power, would limit their Efforts to that sim
end. Neither at wholesale nor retail shot
anything other than pure butter be sold
such. We have right to demand that
penalties for the violation of such statu
shall be heavy enough, and the officials act
enough, to thoroughly accomplish the wo
which is not one-quarter so difficult as
suppression of illicit distillation."
Our Forests.
S. @. Psttee of Merrimack county, N.
evidently forest infdel, contributes
FILL H. ~ NIL l.