BREAD.—The manufacture of bread is regulated in London and within ten miles of the Royal Exchange by the Bread Act, 1822, and in other parts of England and Scotland by the Bread Act, 1836, the provisions of both Acts being practically identical. The Sale of Food and Drugs Acts, 1875 to 1899, which are set out in the article ADULTERATION, have also reference to bread, its manufacture and adulteration. Bread made of flour or meal of wheat, barley, rye, oats, buckwheat, Indian corn, peas, beans, rice, or potatoes may be made with any common salt, pure water, eggs, milk, barm, leaven, potato or other yeast, and mixed in such proportions as the baker may think fit, but with no other ingredient or matter whatsoever. Any baker, or person who makes bread for sale, or his servant, who should make bread by any other mixture than the above is liable to a penalty of £10, and the fact of the conviction will be published at his expense in the local papers. A penalty of £20 will be forfeited by any person who, in grinding or selling any corn, meal, or flour, mixes therewith any ingredient not the real and genuine produce of the corn or flour so ground or sold. Bread made or sold, or exposed for sale when made, wholly or partially of peas, or beans, or potatoes, or of any sort of corn or grain other than wheat, is required to be marked with a large Roman M; for non-compliance here with the penalty is ten shillings for every pound weight of bread so made, sold, or exposed for sale. But thii mark is not required when only potato yeast is used in the making of wheaten bread. The magistrates may direct a search of the pr,:mises of millers, bakers, and others, and if any ingredient for adulteration, or any adulterated flour or bread is found, the same may be seized and disposed of; the °Gliders will be penalised, and they ?, ill also be punished in case of obstruction to the search, or of opposition to any other execution of the provisions of the Bread Act. All complaints under the Act must be made within forty-eight hours after the offence has been committed, Except in the cases of French or fancy bread, or rolls, all bread is required to be sold by weight ; the avoirdupois weight of sixteen ounces to the pound, and a beam and scales, with proper weights, or other sufficient balance, must be fixed in a conspicuous part of the shop, on or near the counter, so that all bread there sold may be weighed in the presence of the purchaser. Similar scales and weights, suitable for the purpose ( Turner v. Holder), should be carried in every cart or carriage in which bread is carried or sent out for delivery; and, upon request so to do, the bread must be weighed in the presence of the person purchasing or receiving it. Non-compliance with any of the above provisions as to weights and weighing would subject the offender to penalties.
Where a customer asks a baker for bread by weight, the baker, whether he gives him ordinary bread or fancy bread, is bound to serve him with it as bread sold by weight, and which has been weighed. If the baker has only fancy bread, he should so inform the customer. The understood weight of a quartern loaf is four pounds; it is not sufficient that the loaf weighed this before baking, if when sold it weighed less. Mere superiority in the quality of bread will not class it with fancy bread, as distinguished from ordinary; there must also be a dissimilarity in size, shape, and appearance from ordinary household bread. But merely making in separate loaves, baking so as to be crusty all over, and differing from ordinary bread only in the manner of baking, will not constitute French or fancy bread, even if the particular bread is known in the trade as French or fancy.
If a servant or journeyman has, through wilful misconduct, caused his master to incur any penalty, the master may complain to the magistrates, who will punish the servant or journeyman. After the hour of half-past one in the afternoon of Sunday, a baker may not bake or sell bread, or bake meat or pies, or in any way exercise his trade, except only to prepare for his next day's baking ; so far as it is an authorisation to bake on Sunday, this regulation does not extend to Scotland. A miller or baker may not act as a justice in respect of any of the above offences.
Prosecutions for adulteration may be under the old Bread Acts or the Food and Drugs Acts. The latter would probably be the Acts preferred by the prosecution, as the penalties thereunder are severer than those inflicted by the older Acts, and it is not necessary to prove guilty knowledge on the part of the offender or his servants in order to obtain a conviction. Proof of such knowledge would lie upon the prosecution when proceeding under the Bread Acts ; indeed, a leading case on the doctrine of "guilty knowledge" arose out of a prosecution in respect of bread adulterated with alum, but this was in the year 1814, some time before the Bread Acts. But the case is interesting, as it was held, and the holding is still adhered to, that the use of alum in the manufacture of bread is a noxious adulteration, and that a man who made and sold such bread could be criminally responsible for any injuries to health resulting from the eating thereof. Apart, however, from this case, alum cannot be lawfully used in the manufacture of bread, for, as will be seen above, it is not one of the ingredients permitted by the Bread Acts. But technical opinion differs to-day as to the injurious effect of the use of alum ; it is, however, agreed that its use enables the baker to substitute inferior flour for good. See BAKEHOUSE.