with some mild disinfectant, such as very
dilute carbolic acid or hydrogen peroxide, and then to bind the wound
with a clean cloth, to prevent later entrance of germs.

234. Chemicals as Food Preservatives. The spoiling of meats and
soups, and the souring of milk and preserves, are due to germs which,
like those producing disease, can be destroyed by heat and by
chemicals.

Milk heated to the boiling point does not sour readily, and successful
canning consists in cooking fruits and vegetables until all the germs
are killed, and then sealing the cans so that germs from outside
cannot find entrance and undo the work of the canner.

Some dealers and manufacturers have learned that certain chemicals
will act as food preservatives, and hence they have replaced the safe
method of careful canning by the quicker and simpler plan of adding
chemicals to food. Catchup, sauces, and jellies are now frequently
preserved in this way. But the chemicals which destroy bacteria
frequently injure the consumer as well. And so much harm has been done
by food preservatives that the pure food laws require that cans and
bottles contain a labeled statement of the kind and quantity of
chemicals used.

Even milk is not exempt, but is doctored to prevent souring, the
preservative most generally used by milk dealers being formaldehyde.
The vast quantity of milk consumed by young and old, sick and well,
makes the use of formaldehyde a serious menace to health, because no
constitution can endure the injury done by the constant use of
preservatives.

The most popular and widely used preservatives of meats are borax and
boric acid. These chemicals not only arrest decay, but partially
restore to old and bad meat the appearance of freshness; in this way
unscrupulous dealers are able to sell to the public in one form or
other meats which may have undergone partial decomposition; sausage
frequently contains partially decomposed meat, restored as it were by
chemicals.

In jams and catchups there is abundant opportunity for preservatives;
badly or partially decayed fruits are sometimes disinfected and used
as the basis of foods sold by so-called good dealers. Benzoate of
soda, and salicylic acid are the chemicals most widely employed for
this purpose, with coal-tar dyes to simulate the natural color of the
fruit.

Many of the cheap candies sold by street venders are not fit for
consumption, since they are not only made of bad material, but are
fre