Poisoning by Confectionery.
By Polyclinic
A CASE has just been decided in one of the Philadelphia courts, in which a well-known confectioner was the defendant in a damage suit brought by a boarding-house keeper, in whose house a number of cases of poisoning occurred after eating cream-puffs prepared by the aforesaid defendant. The testimony showed that the puffs were made on a Saturday morning in June, sent some distance by train, and eaten on Sunday, about four P. M., some thirty hours after being made. All those who partook of them (and it appears that no one ate more than a single puff, some not even that much) were taken violently ill with symptoms of cholera morbus. In a few cases the patients were obliged to remain in bed several days. The case, as presented, clearly showed that the symptoms were due to the puffs. This effect of cream-puffs, when eaten more than twenty hours after being made, is by no means uncommon. Chemical examination of portions of puffs which have caused most decided symptoms, has failed to show any mineral irritant, and it is very evident that the action is due to a decomposition which takes place in the complex articles from which the puffs are made—milk, butter, flour, and eggs. All such fancy articles are liable to become the cause of gastro-intestinal irritation, simulating poisoning; and possibly some of the cases of supposed poisoning from metallic contamination of canned vegetables may be ascribed to a similar cause. In the case just tried, Judge Yerks very properly ruled that, while the puffs were undoubtedly the cause of the trouble, there was nothing to connect the confectioner with any responsibility in the matter, and a nonsuit was granted.