STATE HOBTICULTUfiAL SOCIETY, • 175 



the age are city problems. Democracy has failed in many of our 

 large cities and the people are calling wildly on State legislatures for 

 protection. In this very town (Minneapolis) citizens have been pub- 

 licly asked to contribute to the suppo.t of a soldiery, lialjle to be use- 

 ful in putting down the " dangerous classes." 



Passing without mention a large group of city problems I come at 

 once to the sanitary problem. As life and health are more precious 

 than all other thi)igs, the sanitary interests of cities outweigh all 

 other interests. And still I think it can be showji that in the long 

 run the economic interests of a city are best subserved by effective 

 sanitation at almost any cost. If citizens mean to live and live well 

 they must provide for these fundamental things: 



1. A well drained and uncontaminated terrain for their city. 



2. An abundant supply of pure water. 



3. The uninterrupted access of fresh air to all passages and en- 

 <closures. 



4. The removal and purification of filth and rubbish of every kind. 

 If cities were built ideally according to plans and specifications, 



these fundamental things would be attended to first of all. As a mat- 

 ter of fact they are tardily undertaken when the increase of disease and 

 death frightens the powers that be, into action. And it rarely hap- 

 pens in this land of local administration, that any orderly plan is 

 made or followed. 



It is of one of these four fundamental things, the removal of city 

 rubbish and filth, that I am, by the kind invitation of your president, 

 permitted to speak at this time. If the subject should prove uninter- 

 esting I throw the responsibility on his broad shoulders, well able to 

 bear it. 



Next to the people who create the filth of the cities, the market 

 gardeners, fruit farmers and dairymen who environ modern cities, are 

 most interested in its proper disposal. In an ideal state of cultiva- 

 tion every particle of decomposed atiimal and vegetable matter goes 

 back to the soil whence it came. The waste and offal which are now 

 filling and polluting our streams, lakes and bays and destroying their 

 fish, will some day cover places now desolate with blooming gardens 

 and fruit-laden orchards. 



It seems to me that without delay a goodly portion of the city filth 

 should be put to its proper use of fertilization in the neighborhood of 

 cities. I should be glad if this paper would set a single person to 

 work on this problem. I hope it may set more than one to thinking. 



Some account of various plans for disposing of city offal may prove 

 interesting and furnish suggestions for further efforts. 



