O THE TONER LECTURES. 



for municipal purposes, would, from its fertility and its nearness 

 to the market, have an agricultural value fully compensating for 

 the original and permanent cost of its improvement. 



The flats about the city being brought to a proper conditioUj 

 the next object that claims our attention is the drying of the soil 

 of those parts which are now conspicuously subject to saturation. 



There are two leading objections to the saturation of the soil of 

 an occupied site : The first and most clearly defined is the now 

 recognized influence which soil saturation has in the production or 

 aggravation of diseases of the lungs. It has been clearly shown 

 by Dr. Bowditch, and confirmed by other observers, that there is a 

 direct relation between consumption and a wet soil in the vicinity 

 of the dwelling. It is known, too, that the condition of the 

 atmosphere caused by excessive wetness of the ground is unfavorable 

 as regards other diseases of the respiratory apparatns. In Wash- 

 ington in 1879, out of a total death list of 4,309, 1,341 deaths 

 — being over thirty per cent, of the total mortality — were due to 

 consumption and pneumonia. It would be too much to say that 

 these diseases are to be completely eradicated by a thorough 

 drainage of the soil ; for constitutional taint, exposure in other 

 places, and various other causes must still have their influence. 

 But these diseases, which for years past have invariably stood as 

 the first two of the mortality list, may certainly be enormously 

 reduced in their fatal eflTect. 



The other disadvantage of a wet soil is less clearly defined, 

 and its efiects are less readily separated from those of other causes 

 of ill-health and of death. Precisely what processes are going on 

 under the surface of the ground — what is the kind, extent, and 

 character of the decomposition of organic matter there taking 

 place — has not yet been determined with scientific accuracy. We 

 have theories only, but they are well founded and reasonable, and 

 they command the confidence of those whose business it is to con- 

 sider such matters. Whatever the processes, it is undoubtedly 



