all drugs, chemicals or medicinal preparations which do not conform to the proper and recognized standards of strength and purity. For several years the Wisconsin Pharmaceutical association has likewise made the commendable effort, through the appointment of a committee on adulterations, to exercise the requisite control over the purity of drugs, but it is not to be expected that such a committee should undertake to perform gratuitously so extended and important a public service as is thereby involved, nor has it been found possible with the limited time and opportunities of such a committee, composed of practical pharmacists, to adequately accomplish the purpose in view.

The work of the Dairy and Food commission, as elsewhere explained, has thus far been necessarily limited to the duties of inspecting important dairy products and such other articles of food as seemed to require more immediate examination. It is apparent, however, that it is not only wise and expedient, but eminently desirable, that the commission should seek at the earliest opportunity to extend its usefulness to the broadest attainable limits, and thus to truly accomplish the mission for which it was designed.

In order that this purpose may be realized, and that proper attention should be given to the inspection and examination of important drugs, as well as to a large number of products classed as food and drink, the services of an additional assistant are required. The duties and functions of such an assistant would demand, moreover, that he should be not only a thorough chemist, but also an acknowledged expert in the examination and analysis of drugs and products of pharmaceutical art, as well as in branches involving microscopical research and skill.

It is believed that with suitable and necessary provisions the excellent facilities of the Department of Pharmacy, of the University of Wisconsin, might be further utilized in the directions indicated, and by the appointment of a competent assistant, who should be permanently associated with the School of Pharmacy, a co-operation of closely allied interests would be effected, which would be of widely recognized value in the extent and character of the service

rendered to the state. For the accomplishment of this extension of the service of the commission, it is estimated that an increase of $2,000 should be made to its annual appropriation, at least $1,000 of which should constitute the salary of the expert assistant to be employed, and the remainder to constitute a fund for meeting such contingent expenses as the increased duties of the office may involve. The recommendations thus embodied, which have already received the approval of the President of the University, as well as the director of the School of Pharmacy and the Wisconsin Pharmaceutical association, are therefore submitted with the confidence of their receiving also your favorable consideration.

LEGISLATION.

But few laws have been passed by states defining the powers and duties of officers regarding adulteration. The state of New York took the initiative in this matter and for six years effective work has been done in that state. At the outset the duties of the commissioner related only to dairy products, but from time to time the scope of requirements has been extended and food standards are being established. When the legislature of Wisconsin passed a law creating the Dairy and Food commission there were but few laws at hand from which food standards could be obtained and no data which were specific enough to determine what articles of food required attention. The work of this department has been devoted almost exclusively to gathering samples of foods and testing them in order to gather facts so that when the next legislature convenes we would be in a position to place before the members an intelligent statement of the frauds that are perpetrated upon the public and remedies to eradicate the evils. The court of appeals of New York says: "It is notorious that the adulteration of food products has grown to proportions so enormous as to menace the health and safety of the people. Ingenuity keeps pace with greed, and the careless and heedless consumers are exposed to increasing perils. To redress such evils is a plain duty but a difficult task.

perience has taught the lesson that repressive measures which depend for their efficiency upon proof of the dealer's knowledge and of his intent to deceive and defraud are of little use and rarely accomplish their purpose. Such an emergency may justify legislation which throws upon the seller the entire responsibility of the purity and soundness of what he sells and compels him to know and to be certain."

With considerable trouble all the laws upon adulteration have been gathered from Europe and America. The department feels confident that, with the aid of the experience that other countries and states have had, coupled with the data which have been secured by work in the laboratory, laws can be framed which will cover all exigencies which exist in our state, in a satisfactory manner.

There is no more important subject before the thinking public to-day than the condition of our food supply. Dr. Beckwith, of the Ohio state board of health, says: "No subject in the last decade, relating to the human economy, has received greater consideration or elicited fuller discussion than the contamination of food through the agency of adulteration."

"The wonderful revelations of science have made possible not only the wholesale sophistication of most of our food products, but have provided a way, in numerous cases, for the actual substitution of fraudulent, if not pernicious substances for many others.

“To such an enormous extent has sophistication been carried within the past few years, that legislative action in nearly all civilized countries of the world has been taken, with a view of alleviating, if not relieving, the sufferings of protesting humanity."

The wisdom of legislation is well illustrated in the dominion of Canada. The work of examination began in 1876, when 51.66 per cent. of the articles examined were found adulterated. In 1882 this percentage had been reduced to 25.

Secretary Rusk said in his address at the Ohio state fair: "More than one-half of the income of the average wage.

earners of the human race is spent for food. The special sphere of the agricultural department is to enlarge the facilities for providing food. Let it also be the special sphere of the department to see that the food supplied be pure and wholesome. Every product must be sold for what it is. The adulteration of foods is injurious to public morals. It tends to lower the price of the legitimate product, and hence injure the farmer. I am unalterably opposed to any deception in the naming of any article which uses the prestage of the farm to cover up the fraud of the manufacturer. We must increase and extend our foreign markets by every legitimate means in our power, by surrounding the manufacture of our various food products with such stringent regulations that the word 'American' or the brand 'U. S.' on any food product will be recognized the world over as synonymous with the words 'pure' and 'wholesome.'

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In conclusion, I tender my thanks to the press, in the state and out of it, for the aid it has rendered in establishing the purpose of the commission in the understanding of the people. I am also grateful to the district attorneys for their efficient service, and to the merchants and manufacturers for their co-operation.

I am, sir, your obedient servant,

H. C. THOM,

Commissioner.

REPORT OF THE STATE CHEMIST.

HON. H. C. THOM,

MADISON, Wis., Sept. 30, 1890.

State Dairy and Food Commissioner:

SIR: I have the honor to submit the following report for the year ending September 30, 1890:

MILK.

Milk, like all products of the animal body, is of very complex composition. To the ancient as well as the modern world it was a fluid of great virtue, and was the first form of food that received the attention of physicians and experimenters. To it was ascribed valuable medicinal qualities. Hippocrates, the celebrated physician, prescribed milk, either that of the cow, ewe, or the goat, in certain ailments, but forbade its use in cases of headache, fever and bilious attacks. Aristotle decided that "milk is elaborated not decomposed blood." Avicenna and Placitus devote many pages to the subject, and gravely discuss whether milk was hot, cold or moist; concluding that animal milk, compared with that of human, is cold; human with that of animal, hot. Only three parts were at first recognized in milk, viz.: Serum, butter and curd. Bartoletus, in 1619, was the first to mention a fourth constituent, milk sugar. In his day, sulphur, mercury, and a saline principle were considered as the three active essences of all things; hence, from the yellow color of the butter, Bartoletus referred it to a sulphur principle, the whey to quick silver, and the curd to a saline element. He also compares milk with blood. In the eighteenth century Leeuwenhoek first observed milk under the miscroscope. He saw that it