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waiting-rooms themselves,. where the superannuated sofas- ! fthanks to the overheated atmosphere diffused from ill- i iregulated edlorifercs-give out again all that they have 1

absorbed from relays of sitters, many of whom are 1

the reverse of fanatical on the score of personal personal ablution. The buffets, too, at which a hasty meal 7

may be snatched or a more leisurely repast consumed

in expectation of a train ’in ritardo’ are not

always supplied with such food or drink as the invalid

or even the healthy subject can safely indulge in-tinnedmeats or "preserved" " vegetables or portable soups of un-certain date often entering into the menu. The same may besaid of the wines and the mineral waters, not invariably aninnocuous alternative to the so-called acqua potabile’ ofsubsoil origin ! 1 The British press, professional and lay, towhich Italy appeals for countenance in carrying through hermuch required railway reforms, has done much, and may dostill more, in impressing upon the central authority at Romethe urgent need for making passenger traffic less fraught withdiscomfort and risk and less, by consequence, of a deterrent.There have been this season, it is said, fewer arrivals fromthe British Isles than Italy has known for many a day ; butwith the obstacles which she places in the path of her mostwelcome visitors, her press, headed by the Milanese journal,is more than justified in exclaiming Q2cid gnirum! ’ "

MILK-SUPPLY AND THE LONDON COUNTYCOUNCIL.

ON the ground that many of the powers sought in theGeneral Powers Bill, which stands for second reading in theHouse of Commons on April llth, are controversial andwould if retained delay the passage of the Bill the Parlia-mentary Committee has advised the Council to delete whatare considered to be the contentious clauses. These include

proposals relating to the sale of milk which were as

follows : (1) to enable the Council to prohibit thesale of milk from any dairy situated within or without thecounty in which the medical officer suspects that cases ofinfectious disease within the county occurring in more than ione sanitary district are attributable to the milk suppliedfrom such dairy ; (2) to enable the council to take samplesof milk at railway stations and elsewhere in the countywith the view of preventing the sale of milk unfit forhuman consumption ; (3) to enable the council’s medical

officer to require dairymen to furnish lists of sources ofmilk and of their customers with a view of prevent-ing the spread of infectious disease ; and (4) to requiredairymen to notify under penalty all cases of infectiousdisease among their servants and to prohibit any personsuffering from an infectious disease from milking any animal,the milk of which is intended for consumption within

the county. On the face of it, the decision of the Council todrop these clauses appears to be opposed directly to the canonsof preventive medicine. Nothing is more certain than thatcontaminated milk is a very serious factor in the spread ofinfectious disease and therefore it is of the utmost import-ance that the public health should be jealously guarded byplacing everything connected with the production and distri-bution of milk under an efficient system of control. It is, infact, difficult to imagine any other clauses in the Bill whichcan relate to questions of greater importance. The Council’s

anxiety seems to be to get the Bill through the Housethis session, and the feeling apparently is that if the milkclauses are retained the chances of the Bill passing wouldbe very remote owing to the opposition shown by all kindsof authorities. We are aware that county and municipalauthorities have already large powers for dealing with themilk-supply, but it is obvious in the case of London that

powers are wanted to deal with the milk at its source of

supply as well as at the distributing agencies. The Billintroduced by Mr. John Burns in the House of Commons aweek ago does not relate to these questions, but merely seeksto sanction regulations for the supply of sterilised milk frommunicipal milk depots without rendering the local authoritiesliable to surcharge by the official auditor.

AN IMPERIAL CONFERENCE ON HYGIENE ANDTEMPERANCE.

Ix order to stimulate general interest in the scientific

teaching of hygiene and temperance as an integral basis ofnational education, and to bring before the country duringthe visit of the Colonial Premiers trustworthy information asto what is done in various parts of the Empire, a committee,numbering - among its members Sir Lauder Brunton, SirThomas Barlow, Mr. A. Pearce Gould, Sir Victor and LadyHorsley, Mr. W. McAdam Eccles, Surgeon-General G. J. HeEvatt, Mr. C. H. Watts Parkinson, Mr. A. W. Mayo Robson,Dr. E. Claude Taylor, and Professor G. Sims Woodhead, hasbeen formed to convene a Conference on the Teaching ofHygiene and Temperance in the Universities and Schools ofthe British Empire on St. George’s Day, April 23rd. The

conference has the approval of Lord Elgin, Secretary of Statefor the Colonies, who has promised to attend if his engage-ments at the Colonial Conference permit. Lord Strathcona.and Sir John Gorst will respectively take the chair at themorning and afternoon sessions. Arrangements have been.made for officially appointed educational experts to describecolonial systems of teaching the two subjects, while paperswill also be read by leading continental savants. Furtherinformation and tickets of admission may be obtained fromthe honorary organising secretary, Miss St. John Wileman,

11, Chandos-street, Cavendish-square, London, W.PRECIPITINS.

THAT scientific discoveries apparently most recondite andfar removed from practical application may ultimately proveof great commercial or technical value might be demon-strated by innumerable examples. One such is seen in the

application of the recently discovered precipitin reaction ofTchistovitch to medico-legal investigation. When the blood

of one species of animal is injected into the body of an,individual of another species it is found that the serum.of the latter acquires the property of giving rise to a.

precipitate when added to a solution of the serum ofthe former or to a solution of any albuminous materialderived from that species. By this means it is possibleto identify, for example, bloodstains as human which

by microscopical examination could only have been cer-

tainly ascertained to be of some mammalian origin. The-reaction is indeed not absolutely specific, since blood froma nearly allied species-e.g., apes-may give a somewhatsimilar result, but it is not difficult to distinguish the two,

by quantitative tests. The precipitin reaction is now definitelyrecognised as a medico-legal test of great value in countriesso diverse as Germany, Austria, the United States, Egypt, andRoumania. No instance of its employment in this countryappears to be recorded. But the value of the reaction is notconfined to this field. Its delicacy is such that it far surpassesthe ordinary methods of proteid coagulation as a chemical test

i for these substances ; it may be applied to detect adultera-tion in food materials, and has been employed by the biolo--gist as a proof of a true group-relationship between animals ofallied species. The interesting investigations of Professor; D. A. Welsh and Dr. H. G. Chapman’ have thrown a newlight on the actual nature of the phenomenon of precipita-

tion. They find that the substance precipitated is derived

1 Welsh and Chapman: Proceedings of the Royal Society, B.,vol. lxxviii., 1906.