No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRIOHT.TnRE. 421 



HYGIENE OF THE FA KM. 



15V l>i[. llAKViiY B. Basuokb, West Fairview. 



We have all gotten the idea, or at least we used to have, that 

 farm and country life was just about the ideal thing, and that farm- 

 ing was the ideal business. In -some respects it is, but it does not 

 quite come up to the sanitary standard, and for this reason it i:* 

 worthy of attention, for we want to make it as healthy as possible, 

 since on the farming population depends the stability of the country. 



Then again, both in town and country, we are apt to get a little 

 careless about human life and to think that disease is the gift of 

 an all-wise Providence, instead of the result of our own carelessness. 

 It has been said that a dead cow will attract the attention of any 

 government on earth quicker than five dead men or fifteen dead 

 children. Perhaps this is so, and if it is, it has a very good explana- 

 tion in the fact that cattle are readily convertible into cash, where- 

 as human life is not so, and anything which affects us in a matter 

 of dollars and cents is very quickly noticed. This is human nature, 

 at present, at least. A very interesting example on this line came 

 to my attention at one of the institutes last year. A certain farmer 

 had four of his famil}' in bed with typhoid fever and the doctor ad- 

 vised closing the well and getting water elsewhere. This he refused 

 to do. Finally his cows became sick and the veterinarian, taking 

 his cue from the physician, recommended closing the well to save 

 the rest of his stock, and the well was closed. 



It is absurd to think that this man cared less for his family than 

 h'^ did for his stock, but the fact that dollars and cents were slipping 

 away quickened his perception. 



"But is the country really unhealthy?" somebody asks. Here are 

 some facts: Though the death rate is lower, as a rule, both in 

 town and country than ever before, the greatest' lessening has been 

 in the cities. In Connecticut, for example, during the last ten years, 

 the city mortality has dropped from 20 to 17 per 1,000, while the 

 rural only from 17 to 16 per 1,000. In Massachusetts the difference 

 has been still less, and in New York State the rural mortality rate 

 has actually increased. 



Pennsylvania statistics are incomplete, yet in the beautiful Cum- 

 berland county, just across the river from Harrisburg. willi a rural 



