Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-07-27
FOOD ADULTERATI0N.
A Ground Cinnamon That Was Made
by Grinding Up Cigar Boxes.
COFFEE MADE OF SPLIT BEANS.
Pulverized Cocoanut Shells Doctored UI
and Sold as Pepper.
COMMUNION WINE FIT FOB A SEWER
WRITTEN FOR THE DISPATCH,

| and if we believe what we hear and read, il
| does an incalculable amount of harm. Or
the other hand, it does a world of good
And, strange to say, of this side of its career
and conduct we hear and read little or moth.
| ing.
Bread and butter are probably the most
| important elements in the life of every citi
zen. Our daily food is of greater Importance
than our annual suffrage, and in this field
the Government has long been doing quail
ity and quantity of work that are admirable
to the highest degree. The work is the ex'
animation, analysis and valuation of every
kind of food and drink that comes to this
country from abroad, as well as
of many kinds that are produced
at home; the suppression, con-
| fiscation or destruction of unwholesome and
injurious goods; the punishment of offenders
of all sorts and the publication Of all the
| transactions involved in scientific and con-
else form for future reference.
GOOD, BAD AND INDIFFERENT.
The work it must be confessed is done in
rather haphazard way. In the first place
| the National Government employees a score
| Custom Houses of New York, Boston and
| such other leading cities as are legal ports
| of entry. Second in importance Is the Ma
tional Board of Health, which every year
publishes one or more ponderous volumes of
its proceedings, The third machine consists
of the State Boards of Health, which are of
all sorts, varying from that of Massachu-
setts, which has a worldwide name and
fame to that of Delaware, which has no
name at all. Still another machine is the
local boards of health, which are liable to
occasionally do something of value, but sell
dom indulge in the luxury.
So far as our daily food is concerned the
most interesting if not the most valuable
work has been done by the Custom House
chemists and few of the State Boards of
Health. They are the bulwarks between
our stomachs, if not our health and life, and
the nercenary merchants and manufacturers
who are only too glad to earn an honest
penny BY aduIteratiDg and initiating vaiu-
able goods, repairing and Disgusting worth
less goods and substituting bad articles for
those which are good. The struggle be-
tween the two is very much like that be-
tween ,the shoemaker and the safe-breaker,
or the banker and the burglsr-frst one is
slightly ahead and then the other.
sHREwD FELLOWS TO DEAL WITH.
The dishonest merchants and manufactur-
ers are men OF brains and rely upon science
to obtain increased profits. Under various
pretexts, they, if foreigners, retain great
servants like Pasteur, Tessie du Motay,
Reich and Richter and if fellow citizens,
Chandler, Austen, Wyatt and Bolton to
solve chemical and technical questions,
whose solution means a new way of deceiy-
ing the public. As an illustration of this
any number OF queer tricks can be given
which are now matter of official record, In
the tea trade for instance, black tea was
found to be adulterated with sloe and other
leaves in ever increasing proportions and
green tea to be weighted with impurities
aud colored with copper salts. The wealthy
British tea dealers in the East were the
guilty parties in every case. When the
Government declared war on both frauds,
they dwindled away Immediately. As
cheap teas remained as universal for several
years thereafter as they had been before, an
other investigation was made, resulting in
the discovery that over 20 domestic con-
Germs were buying spent and damaged tea
leaves, recurring and re-coloring them and
then selling them as bona Jfde, first class
commercial article.
More remarkable is the story of cheap
pepper. Within the memory of many
readers pure pepper was the rule and i'm
pure the exception. Our foreign dealers
began to adulterate their goods until the
condition of affairs was reversed. The Gov
ernment finally took hand in it and the
bogus pepper business forthwith began to
decline, at least so lar as the Custom House
was concerned. In our own market, on the
other hand, il increased with even greater
GROUND CoCoANUT SHELLS FOR PEPPER,
A careful analysis by the Massachusetts
Board OF Health showed that two or more of
our leading dealers in cocoanuts were in.
creasing their profits by pulverizing broken
cocoanut she'll, which had formerly been
thrown away, and mixing the resulting
powder with ground pepper. When the at
tention OF the authorities was called to this
swindle, which, strange to say, is confined
to Boston, New York, Philadelphia and
pepper all over the country took sudden |
rise.
The improvement did not continue long
time, tor the trade price lists had hardly |
more than reached Europe. when some enter |
prising French and Italian manufacturers |
began to send US huge bags of "poivrette."
This delectable compound is made by grind |
ing up almond shells, olive stones, cherry |
twigs and other ligneous fbers. 1t is util- |
lied by favering it with a few drops of pep
per extract or mixing 1t with from one-half |
to one-tenth its weight of genuine ground |
pepper. Amusing to relate, when the whole |
sale grocers and spice dealers found out |
about "poivrette, which they did a few |
months after its appearance in the New |
World, the loudest denunciations of the new |
adulterant came from the lips of the worthy |
grinder He was so anxious
for the health of his fellow countrymen as
10 urge the passage Of a law making it q
crime to sell or treat "poivrette" as pepper |
under any and all circumstances.
A CLEVER SUGAR FRAUD.
Sometimes the Custom House chemists |
come out ahead. At one time when the |
sugar duty depended upon the color OF the |
article, being lowest upon the raw dark |
brown and highest upon pure white, the |
officials noticed a sudden falling off in the |
imports of The latter and an immense in |
crease of the. former. A sample was secured, |
which, to the eye, and judged by ordinary |
standards, the stuff seemed to be the poorest |
md impurest raw sugar imported. The |
,hemists went to work with will, and in a
hort time demonstrated that the raw sugar
1ad been refined in the West Indies. and |
hen to make the tariff as light as possible
had been mixed with fine clay until it
ooked more like mud than anything sweet.
w hen bought by an American refiuer. it
,nly needed to be dissolved in water, fl
cred in the ordinary way, boiled down and
hen it is ss plre and white sugar as can
De produced. On account of this fraud the |
Government changed its system of yalus-
ion, and now uses the polariscope to deter
nine the strengh of imported raw sugars.
Equally striking was an experience of the
State Board of Health. In