The Montgomery advertiser., 1907-06-30
A FORTUNATE CITY.

; The Boston Globe felicitates that great city over what it claims to be the fact that "the heavily watered. generously sSipmed. colored and pre- served milk of former times Is prac- tically unknown" and that the people now have pure milk to drink. If The Globe Is correct in its claims. Bos- ton and her authorities are certainly to be congratulated. It says that there are now about 4,6o0 milkmen, shop keepers and others engaged in produc- ing, handling and selling milk, and if out of all that number there are none but honest and conscientious persons it Is really a wonder.
 We are continually reading in the newspapers of New York, Philadelphia, Chicago and other large cities conn plaints of adulterated. impure and of- ten poisonous milk. and efforts to corr rect the evil amount to little. Boston was in the same list few years ago, but The Globe leads us to believe that the city has gotten itself out of the list.
 We repeat that Boston is fortunate. and its success almost phenomenal. There are two reasons why milk adui- iteration is so common in the large cit- ies.1 One is that interruptions men arc as likely to be engaged in that busi- ness as in any other: men who have no regard for honesty or for the health of others, but consult only their own profits, and resort to any method that will add to their gains. The other req son lies in the fact that in large cities the demand for milk is so great. and so often in excess of the supply, that even men who are ordinarily honest will not hesitate to add something they look on as harmless in order to be able to supply the constant demands on them. It is such an easy matter to add little water, little chalk, per haps a little of something else that is not COHStOGECu uuIlAuI AAAb At VIII pe done without thought of any harm re- su1ting from 1t.
 And yet there are many instances where water is one of the most dan- gerous additions that could be made to milk From all parts of the country we hear complaints of the water sup ply being contaminated by disease germs. Even in the rural districts there may be impure water and if any of this germ loaded water is mixed with the milk the result may be any, thing but desirable. The milkman or dealer who adds the water. not being an expert, cannot know that he is ada ing disease to the fluid, and for the same reason the consumer may not be aware of the danger until the harm Is done.
 As a matter of fact tlere are few articles of human diet in which purity is more essential than in this. Even adult consumers may not be able to detect anything wrong with the milk they drink and may also escape serious harm, but the infants and helpless children are not. so fortunate. There are so many cases where the mother cannot or will not feed her babe on her own milk that resort must be had to the product of the COW, and the child can neither detect nor refuse the poisonous food. To this cause, as in- vestigation has shown. is due much of kthe great infant mortality reported by the mortuary statistics of the great cities. It Is literally a slaughter of the innocents" which is cruel, inhu- man and largely avoidable. and fol which the criminals rarely receive just punishment-ln this world. at least Again, we say, that Boston Is to be congratulated if The Globe Is right in its conclusions.