684 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



"Cleanliness withont is ns necessary as cleanliness witliin, and watch- 

 ful care is required in tins, for not always can noxious vapors be detected 

 by the sense of smell, as some very harmful gasses are nearly odorless. 



Pure water is always needed and very often not present, hence the 

 location of the well is of tlie .greatest imi)ortance. and convenience is not 

 the tirst consideration. 



The well water should not he surface water. There is, at varyin.y 

 depths, an ocean iniderlyin.i>- all the earth, wliicli we call living water 

 level. This ocean has two movements, one lateral, ever flowing- toward 

 the sea, the other vertical, rising or falling as the season is wet or 

 di'y. The well shoidd reach this living stream. It may be given as a 

 maxim, nearly always true, that shallow wells are dangerous. Avoid 

 wells that are less than fifteen feet deep, and quarantine those that are 

 less than ten. A well in which the depth of the water varies greatly is 

 also dangerous, as it indicates that the surface water flows into it, and 

 surface water is ever unhealthful, for it gathers innumerable disease 

 germs as it seeps through the earth. Driven wells lessen the danger 

 from this source very materially. It is an established rule of sanitary 

 science, that no vault, cesspool or compost heap shall be allowed within 

 100 feet of a well. How often is tliis disregarded and in how many 

 instances is the desire for convenience permitted to out-weigh all other 

 considerations, and the barn yards placed near the house so that the one 

 well may serve for the stock and the house. This economy may still 

 be accomplished and not at the cost of health, if the well and an elevated 

 tank are placed near the house and the water conveyed to the stock 

 trough in jjipes. 



Abundant sunlight ami absolute cleanliness are the chief means of 

 preventing disease, and eacli one can seciu'e these upon his own prem- 

 ises, and by idacing his home at a sutHcient distance from the neigh- 

 boring dwellings, the danger from infection can be minimized. 



Perhaps the most instructive and forcible lesson, as well as most 

 horrifying, is the record of the terrible plagues that swept over Europe 

 during the Middle Ages. It is estimated that one-fourth of the inhabit- 

 ants of .Southern and Western Europe perished, but one race escaped 

 unscathed. So marked was this immunity, that this people were accused 

 by the stricken people of having poisoned tlie wells of the Christians and 

 many were nuissacred. The wells wei'e imleed poisoned, but it was from 

 the unclean .vards and reeking vaults of those who were immolated upon 

 the altar of their own uncleanliness. The Jews, forced by race hatred, 

 to live sejiarate from the other races and forced to be clean ))y the rigor- 

 ous and unbreakaV)le law of INIoses. lived in health while all tlie (lentile 

 world was A^rapped in ihe pall of death. 



The lesson as to cities has been so well learned, and sanitation 

 is so perfected that to have the smallpox ought to be treated as a crime. 



