“Hail to the Press!— Vast artery of life, through which the stores That feed the growth of Truth, Opinion pours; The mighty lens through which she points the rays That kindle Error’s records into blaze.— Gigantic engine! power that supersedes The long prescriptive _Use_ that Folly pleads.— O happy England! Land of my fathers! may thy children keep. E’en as they guard the empire of the deep, The free, unshackled press, that best secures Their rights, and liberty to truth assures.” MEM.—I have stated at p. 11, on the authority of the author of “_The Oracle of Health and Long Life_,” that the many sudden deaths that are daily happening in and about the metropolis, are no doubt assignable to the unprincipled and diabolical adulterations of food, spirits, malt liquors, and the other necessaries of life. Since that extract was printed in the pages of “_Deadly Adulteration and Slow Poisoning Unmasked_,” I am sorry to say, that I have observed numerous instances of the sudden deaths of persons in apparently perfect health, detailed in the London and country newspapers, and even at the very moment that I am penning this remark, I observe, in the columns of the Herald newspaper, accounts of two persons in the prime of life and in good health, whose deaths happened in a similar way. CONTENTS. Page Introduction 3 Wines and Spirits, Adulteration of, 12 ————————— Tests of, 40 Beer and Ale 50 Bread and Flour 68 Meat and Fish 78 Tea, Coffee, Chocolate, and Sugar 83 Spices 98 Pickles 104 Vinegar 105 Olive Oil 107 Salt and Mustard 108 Anchovy Sauce and Mushroom Catsup 109 Isinglass 110 Blue and Soap 111 Candles and Starch 113 Bees’ Wax 114 Butter 115 Cheese, Bacon and Hams 116 Milk and Cream 118 Potatoes, Fruit, &c. 119 Confectionary and Pastry 122 Perfumery, Cosmetics, Hair Oils, Bear’s Grease, &c. 126 Medicines, Medical Empiricism, Quacks, and Quackery 133 Coals 170