i 4 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Engineer," that they have more scientific knowledge than they are 

 given credit for. 



We ouo-ht, I think, to regard this mutual distrust and lack of con- 

 fidence among these various classes as only another evidence of the 

 overwhelming difficulties of the situation, and of the fact, so apparent 

 to all, that we have been defeated in every direction. As, when an 

 army of disciplined soldiers has been signally routed, the people begin 

 to lose confidence in their officers, and the officers fall to charging each 

 other with incompetency, neglect, and treason so, also, in this case, 

 these murmurs of complaint and of wide-spread dissatisfaction, these 

 mutual criminations and recriminations, imply only a great failure, 

 and not necessarily a dereliction on the part of any one concerned. 

 The odds were against us ; and this is what everybody will, sooner or 

 later, come to understand. 



The public need not lose confidence in either of these classes. Not- 

 withstanding our present seeming antagonism, which may be due in 

 part to a mutual misunderstanding, we are, as will be seen hereafter, 

 converging steadily and rapidly to the same point. It will be found 

 that we are practically united in our demand that plumbers, architects, 

 sanitary engineers, and physicians, shall acquire more knowledge and 

 skill than they now possess ; and that where their united knowledge 

 and skill fail to accomplish the end to which our efforts are at present 

 directed, namely, the exclusion of sewer-gases from our houses, the 

 people shall be urged at once to " to lop off superfluous luxuries " ; in- 

 structing them also that, in exact proportion as their luxurious distri- 

 bution of plumbing is diminished, their safety will be increased. They 

 should be informed, at the same time, that, if they are compelled to 

 submit to the presence of plumbing fixtures near their living apart- 

 ments, they should follow the advice of Professor Doremus, and em- 

 ploy constantly and freely proper disinfectants, of which it is unscien- 

 tific to say that they merely "disguise the bad odors" ; for, if it be 

 true that they do not cause directly the death of all germs, it is never- 

 theless true that they prevent putrefaction of organic matters, and thus 

 destroy the aliment upon which the germs subsist, and by which they 

 are enabled to multiply. 



It would be unjust to say that plumbers, being interested in 

 having the amount of plumbing extended, will be the last to limit its 

 extension. So also, in a pecuniary point of view, are sanitary engi- 

 neers and physicians interested. But no one, I am certain, will charge 

 either of us with being influenced by such considerations. 



Under the present system all that can be said is, that the united 

 skill of the specialists has not, according to their own often-repeated 

 declarations, and as every one knows, succeeded in rendering our 

 houses safe against sewer-gas. We have, indeed, from one source 

 and another, assurances that it can be done ; but there is no proof, 

 such as alone can be furnished by a sufficiently prolonged trial, that 



