276 ROCHESTER ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. [May 1 4, 



taught us any new facts in sanitary science, but it certainly has 

 placed a tremendous emphasis on the importance of putting what we 

 do know into daily practice. Who can compute the cost of a 

 thousand cases of such illness? What is the pecuniary cost in loss of 

 valuable time, and in the expense of nursing and medical attendance ? 

 Who can estimate the physical suffering, the mental distress of those 

 afflicted, each the center of a sympathizing circle, beside the loss of 

 valuable lives ? 



You may say that Buffalo will never repeat this irreparable 

 blunder, and in Rochester it is impossible. But let us remember 

 that the invisible causes of contagious diseases are wonderfully trans- 

 portable, and have free passes on all lines of travel, and so may find 

 access to our water-supply by other means than by pumping in city 

 sewage. We should remember, also, that there are other pathogenic 

 bacilli besides those of typhoid fever, with whose life histories and 

 nature we should be thoroughly acquainted, in order that we may be 

 forearmed. 



With the facts of the Buffalo epidemic clearly before us, can we 

 say that the apprehensions of the lower villages were wholly ground- 

 less, as they thought of the entire sewage from a city of 300,000 

 people being poured into the water from which they must drink ? 

 Consider the contamination which many large cities are daily pouring 

 into Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, and ask yourself if such facts can 

 contribute to the peace of mind of any thoughtful person who draws 

 his supply of water from either of these lakes. We may, I think, 

 congratulate ourselves that our enlarged supply is to be obtained 

 from Hemlock Lake rather than from Lake Ontario. 



The trend and drift of these suggestions may be fairly considered 

 selfish, though in a broad sense. They are in the direction of self- 

 protection and self-preservation. But it may be well to remind 

 ourselves that our city is not an island in the ocean, it has a vicinage 

 and neighbors near and remote. They have rights as well as we, and 

 on these rights we may not trespass. Has a city any more right than 

 a private citizen to render itself a nuisance by discharging its waste 

 upon their property, and rendering odious, if not dangerous, the air 

 they must breathe and the water they must drink ? Is it a premature 

 question to ask if the time has not almost come when cities shall no 

 longer convert the natural waterways into sewers, and the lakes into 

 reservoirs for their sewage ? Methods of sewage disposal and disin- 

 fection have been already so far perfected that in my opinion, at no 

 distant day, compulsory destruction of all offensive and dangerous 



