The Tricks of Trade in the Adulterations of Food and Physic. With Directions for Their Detection and Counteraction.

Bookseller Notes

Published in the wake of the first reports of the Select Committee on Adulteration of Food, which itself formed amid the rising public concerns over food safety led by John Postgate and the earlier work of Frederick Accum. The findings of the Committee were damning, although efforts at legislation 'met with strenuous opposition from retailers' (John Postgate, ODNB); the 1860 Adulteration of Food and Drink Act gave local authorities optional powers, but it wasn't until the Amendment of 1872 and finally the Sale of Food and Drugs Act of 1875 that serious measures were finally put into place.The present work serves more as a - very thorough - warning than a guide, the methods described for detection tending towards a more scientific approach than might be expected of a typical Victorian household, e.g. measuring ratios of ash. The contents list is a rogues gallery of unsavoury business practices, with sections including 'Bone ashes in flour', 'Brick-dust in chicory', and 'Iron filings in tea', to name but a few.