14 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



too often the delicate habits of the female portion of the 

 family, but precious little fresh air is admitted to the house 

 from November to April — about one-half of the year. ^ 



And how about the sleeping-rooms of many of our farmers ? 

 Is it not fair to say that the average New England farmer 

 and his wife sleep in a bedroom on the lower floor of the 

 house, fifteen feet one way, twelve another, and seven or 

 eight feet "between joists," and opening into the kitchen? 

 Perfect ventilation requires that 3,000 cubic feet of fresh air 

 should be su})plied to each person per hour, and sleeping- 

 rooms should allow 1,000 cubic feet of space to each occu- 

 pant. Now the bedroom just mentioned contains less than 

 1,500 cubic feet of space, and how is this for breath capacity 

 for two persons? To be sure this room opens into the 

 kitchen, and thus gives some more air, but what kind of air 

 would you expect to find in a room at the end of an evening 

 where the whole family has been gathered, and where possi- 

 bly some cooking has been going on at the same time ? And 

 does the farmer, or she, the good wife, usually take pains to 

 ventilate the room just before going to bed ? 



But now, in spite of this dreadful state of things, some, yes, 

 many people, do raisQ a family, rear the children to manhood 

 and womanhood, and how is this about ventilation, if you do 

 violate a law of nature? So the Esquimaux eat and relish 

 for a dessert a pound or so of tallow candles. Some Chinese 

 feed on worms, not quite so fat and large as our tobacco 

 worms ; and still I believe there is better food even for them 

 than are these. 



And on the other hand, sometimes the wife begins to go 

 down hill with consumjition, a child dies in convulsions, by 

 pneumonia, cholera morl)Us or infantum, and then at the 

 funeral there is a wonderful submission to the will of the 

 Lord at this most mysterious dispensation of Providence, 

 when the real thing submitted to has been the foul air of the 

 sleeping and living room or past months or years. 



There are some gases almost instantly fatal to life. Car- 

 bonic acid is one. But physiology tells us that there is no 

 poison so fatal to the human race as the exhalations of the 

 human body itself. Carbonic acid probably kills by keep- 

 ing away the oxygen from bodily tissues ; but the decayed, 



