Circular wire frames, made something like casters, and fitted with eight bottles, each holding enough milk for one feeding, may be bought for the purpose of sterilizing at almost any pharmacy. The frame is to be set in a kettle with water in the bottom, which on boiling produces steam, the heat of which does the sterilizing.1 This is an easy method. Another good way is to sterilize at a lower temperature for a longer time, as less change is produced in the constituents of the milk by the lower degree of heat. This may be easily done by immersing the bottles in water at 190° Fahr., and maintaining that temperature for an hour.2

Care of Feeding-bottles. Great care must be taken in cleansing feeding-bottles. When they can be could be traced to the milk supply. The farm from which it came was situated in an adjoining town, and the family of the dealer had been afflicted with diphtheria, two of the children having died. The use of the milk was, of course, promptly stopped.

1 A simple and inexpensive apparatus for sterilizing milk consists of a covered tin kettle ten inches in height by eight inches in diameter, a wire basket, which tits easily into the kettle, supplied with supports or legs projecting one and a half inches from the bottom, one dozen eight-ounce nursing-bottles, and a bundle of fresh cotton wadding. The whole apparatus, costing about $1.25, is kept in most drug stores.

Milk for twenty-four hours' use is properly sweetened and diluted with water in a clean pitcher, and as much of this as the child will take at one feeding is poured into each bottle, and the bottle stopped with cotton wadding, which should fit only moderately tight in the neck of the bottle. The kettle is filled to the depth of one half to one inch with water, the basket containing the bottles placed in it, the kettle covered and placed over a Are until the steam comes out from the sides of the top for half an hour, when the basket containing the bottles should be removed and put in a cool place. When the milk is to be used, it should be heated by placing a bottle in warm water for a few minutes. The cotton is then removed, and a sterilized nipple attached. After the feeding the bottle is cleansed and kept in an inverted position until used again The above directions are those of Dr. Booker, specialist of children's diseases, Johns Hopkins Hospital.

2 In the Walker-Gordon Milk Laboratory, in Boston, milk is sterilized at 175° to 180° Fahr. for fifteen minutes, and it is claimed that this ternwashed immediately after using, it is easy to make them perfectly clean; but when this is impracticable they should be put to soak in cold water, then washed with hot soap-suds, and last boiled for ten minutes in clear water. If flecks dry on the inside, put a teaspoon of rice, or coarse salt, into the bottle with a little water, and shake well until all is removed. Never use shot: it might cause lead poisoning.

Plain rubber nipples alone should be used, never the tube attachment. The nipples should be washed clean and dried after each nursing. Before again using the nipple it should be put into boiling water for ten minutes, and only the rim of it should be touched in handling. The nipple should never be put into the mouth of another person to test the milk.

Condensed Milk. When a large percentage of the water of milk is evaporated, and sugar added, a thick syrup is formed, known as condensed milk.

It is made extensively in Switzerland and America. When sealed air-tight in cans it will keep indefinitely.

Its average composition - a mean of 41 analyses by Prof. Leeds - is as follows:

Water............................................30.34%

Fat.............................................12.10%

Milk-sugar......................................16.62%

Cane-sugar......................................22.26%

Albuminoids....................................16.07%

Ash............................................ 2.61%

Total, 100.00 perature gives the best results for milk to be used within twenty-four hours. If the milk has to be kept a longer time, a higher temperature is necessary, as only the bacteria and not the spores are destroyed by 175° Fahr.

Machines are in use in France which will heat great quantities of milk to about 155° Fahr. and then rapidly cool it. Not all, but nearly all, forms of bacteria likely to be found in milk are destroyed at the temperature of 155°, and the good flavor of the milk is not injured. Such milk is known as Pasteurized milk.

Owing to the additional sugar it is impossible to dilute it so that the protein and sugar shall approach the standard of human milk.

Children fed with it are plump, but have soft flesh; they are large, but not strong, and lack the power of endurance and resistance to disease. Their teeth come late, and they are very likely to have rickets.1 This is enough to indicate that it is not a proper food upon which to feed a child exclusively.

Condensed milk is valuable in emergencies or in traveling, and may also be used occasionally when for any reason the milk supply fails. It has the advantage of being free from ferments and easily kept.

There are physicians who recommend the use of condensed milk, and no doubt, compared with the germ-laden, watery fluid called milk, obtainable in the poorer sections of large cities, it is infinitely better. It should always be diluted with at least ten times its bulk of water.

Preserved Milk. Preserved milk is milk which has been condensed and canned without the addition of sugar. It would be a valuable food for children were it not that it is expensive, and will keep but a few hours after the can is opened. By sterilizing it in flasks with narrow necks, plugged with cotton, it may be kept as other milk is for an indefinite time. As soon as the can is opened, the contents should be poured into a glass or earthen vessel, for, on exposure of the milk to the air, chemical action takes place with the tin.2