318 AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 



appreciated all oyer the south, so that, while it is greatly better to locate a 

 Louse where miasm canuot reach it from ponds, or sluggish streams, or bottom 

 lauds, a farmer whose house is already thus situated is uot without an efficient 

 remedy in the plan proposed above. 



But there is another infallible remedy against miasmatic diseases as to families 

 who feel themselves compelled to live in a house exposed to miasm. It was 

 stated awhile ago that heat so rarefied miasm as to render it innocuous. No 

 family can be troubled with fever and ague in any ordinary locality where that 

 disease prevails, if from June to October a brisk fire is kindled in the family 

 room, to burn for an hour about sunrise and sunset, and if the family are required 

 to repair to that room morning and evening, and remain there at least until 

 they get their breakfjist in the morning, and their supper at the close of the 

 day. It follows, then, that ordinarily, there is nothing unhealthful in the 

 night air after supper. On the contrary, health would be promoted, and im- 

 portant social benefits would accrue to country neighborhoods, if two or three 

 nights of every week after tea were spent in friendly visiting, remaining not later 

 than ten, thus encouraging that interchange of social associations which difi'usea 

 intelligence, promotes kindly feeling, enlarges the views, expands the ideas, 

 and elevates the whole character by cultivating the tastes as to dress, tidiness 

 of person, and the imitation or copying after any ornament or improvement 

 of the grounds and dwellings of the neighborhood. In this way one intel- 

 lio-eut, practical farmer in a neighborhood, by occupying a house which he haa 

 built or remodelled for himself, so as to have all the comforts and conveniences 

 which knowledge and observation and experiment have found to contribute 

 largely to the health, happiness, and thrift of the occupants, will prove a leaven 

 which shall spread from one habitation to another in a comparatively short 

 time, until every dwelling in a circuit of many miles will be more or less im- 

 proved, and thus the face of the whole country be changed for the better, with 

 the promise and realization of a further progress onward and upward. 



RECAPITULATION. 



Although the statements which have been made were presented in connexion 

 with the selection of the most healthful locality for building a new family resi- 

 dence, they are practically applicable to all cases wherein it may be desirable 

 to make a house already built more comfortable and more healthful than it is, 

 because, from what has been stated, it will be seen that a dwelling already 

 erected should not be hastily and blindly abandoned merely oii account of its 

 insalubrity, for, in the light of the above statements, it may be found that the 

 causes of any present sickness ai-e of a transient or of a remediable character, 

 which may thus be illustrated. 



The most favorable circumstances for the production of a miasmatic epi- 

 demic — speedy, malignant, and wide-spreading — are the exposure of the muddy 

 bottom of a pond or sluggish stream to the beaming heat of a summer's sun. In 

 less than a Aveek whole neighborhoods have been stricken with disease, yet, 

 under such circumstances, and according to the well-established laws of miasm, 

 five families may dwell within half a mile of a drained mill-pond, and yet only 

 one will suffer from it, while the other four will remain exempt from unusual 

 disease. 



First. If a rapid stream of considerable width runs between the drained pond 

 and the house. 



Second. If there is interposed a thick hedge or growth of living, luxuriant 

 trees or bushes. A treble row of sunflowers is known to have answered the 

 purpose in repeated cases. 



Third. If the prevailing winds from June to October are from the house 

 toward the pond. 



Fourth. If the house be on a steep hill. 



