The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1889-02-08
FOOD ApuLTeRATloNs,
Most Of Them Harmless, But InfefioR q
the Genuine Articles.

Most Of Them Harmless, hut InferioR -
the Genuine Articles.
The annual report of the Commits
sioner of Internal Revenue contains a
an appendix, report from Prot. Ed
gar Richards, the microscopist Of the
bureau, upon the subject Of the en-
forcement of the law for the proven
ton of the sale OF adulterated foods
and drugs in the District of Columbia.
The report contains table showing
the various food products and their
chief adulterants:
Milk, water, removal Of cream, ad-
ditiOn OF cotton-seed or cleo Oil to
skim milk; butter, water. salt, foreign
fats. artificial coloring matter; cheese,
lard, oleo oil, cotton-seed oil; flour.
bread. other meals, alum; bakers
chemicals, starch, alum; canned foods.
metallic pOisons; tea, exhausted tea
leaves, foreign leaves. tannin, indigo,
Prussian blue, turmeric, gypsum, soap
stone, sand; coffee, chicory, peas,
beans, rye, corn, wheat, coloring mat
ter; cocoa and chocolate, sugar, starch.
flour; beer, artificial glucose, malt and
hop substitutes, sodium bicarbonate,
salt, antiseptics; wines, liquors, water,
spirits, artificial coloring matter, fic-
titious limitations, aromatic others,
burnt sugar, antiseptics; syrup, glu-
cose; honey, glucose-syrup, cane SUI
gar; confectionery. glucose, starch,
artificial essence, poisonous pigments,
terra alba, gypsum; olive oil, cotton
seed and other oils; vinegar, water,
sulphuric acid; pickles, salts of cop
per; spices. flour, starches of various
kinds, turmeric.
IAN inspection of the list" con-
tinues the report, "shows that the
great majority of the substances used
for adulterants are not injurious to
health; the public is cheated, but not
poisoned. They consist for the most
part in the willful and fraudulent ad-
dition OF substances which do not exist
in the normal product, or are only
found there in an appreciately lower
proportion. Another large class con-
sists of simple alterations by the will
full and fraudulent subtraction of some
substance that is normally present in
the product, and which is not found in
the abnormal product, or only in an
appreciably lower proportion. The
number of substances used that are
positively injurious to health is small,
and they generally make their pres
ence felt by the prompt manner in
which dangerous symptoms manifest
themselves in the consumer.
Such are the arsenic, copper, lead
and other metallic poisonous salts that
are sometimes used for artificial colors
in candies. pickles, etc. The use of anti
septics, such as salicylic acids, sui
phate of soda, borax, ETC., for the pre-
vention Of fermentation in improperly
prepared foods, is daily becoming more
frequent. These deserve mention as
being additions to foods of class Of
substances used to cloak carelessness
in manufacture, and producing in many
cases deleterious effects on the human
economy. The addition of such anti
septics as salicylic acid to food pro-
ducts is prohibited in France and Ger
many, though in the latter country
such use is allowed when the food
product is exported to countries where
such addition is not prohibited
Waahin ctOn Star