SEWER-GAS. 13 



guard against accidents," should not the plumbing be overhauled 

 daily ? Absolute security could only in this way be attained. The 

 public is notified, therefore, not by the writer, but by professed sani- 

 tary experts, that in this matter the price of safety is eternal vigi- 

 lance. 



In searching for a remedy for defective plumbing and sewer-gas, 

 the public is still further embarrassed by the fact that the several 

 classes of professional experts, to whom it has been accustomed to 

 look for instruction in matters pertaining to house sanitation, seem to 

 have lost confidence in each other, and are heard constantly, and in 

 the most public manner, charging each other with incapacity. 



The chemists, apparently, are not agreed. The plumbers have 

 been again and again charged with incompetency, and often with in- 

 tentional dishonesty, by sanitary engineers, by physicians, and by the 

 almost universal voice of the people, until to-day it is hard to find a 

 man with sufficient courage to utter a word in their defense. " The 

 sins of the plumbers " has become a proverb. 



An architect, writing for the " The Architect," London, complains 

 that, by eminent doctors, men of his calling have been " sat upon, 

 blackguarded, lectured, blamed," etc., for their supposed ignorance of 

 matters of this sort ; and one gentleman, a sanitary engineer, has said, 

 publicly, that there was " probably only one architect in this city com- 

 petent to execute the specifications for the plumbing of large houses." 

 The same gentleman did not hesitate to say to the Academy that 

 physicians were regarded by plumbers as their ''most wrong-headed 

 customers," and as possessing only " a dangerous smattering " of 

 knowledge upon the subject ; the Academy was permitted, also, to 

 understand that he entertained the same opinion ; while a distin- 

 guished member of the National Board of Health said publicly that 

 he could count upon his five fingers all the sanitary engineers in this 

 country in whom he could place any degree of confidence. 



If all that representative members of these several classes say of 

 each other were true, the outlook would be very unpromising. There 

 is, then, no class of professed artisans or scientists concerned in the 

 business of plumbing, architecture, or house sanitation, who can be 

 safely trusted. 



It is believed, however, that there is some mistake as to the almost 

 total incompetency of plumbers, architects, sanitary engineers, physi- 

 cians, and chemists, to discuss and act upon these subjects intelligent- 

 ly. In short, as I have said before, " I am much more charitable to 

 the plumbers and architects than are the public or the sanitary engi- 

 neers. It seems to me quite probable that most of them are as com- 

 petent and as honest in their special departments as any other class of 

 citizens" ; and I am pleased to see that, so far as the plumbers are 

 concerned, the President of our City Board of Health entertains the 

 same opinion, he having recently declared, according to " The Sanitary 



