726 



SANITARY SCIENCE. 



odor may be noticed whenever the soil is dug 

 up in any part of the city, and trees are often 

 killed by the gas that percolates through the 

 earth about their roots. 



History. Surprise is often expressed that sew- 

 er-gas has been so little heard of until within a 

 few years. During the fifteenth century the 

 Paris sewers were said to be infested by a basi- 

 lisk, the glare of whose demon-like eyes struck 

 dead all who dared approach him. Even medi- 

 cal men accepted this belief, and though many 

 workmen in the sewers died of malaria, noth- 

 ing was done to protect them. It was not 

 until modern improvements came into general 

 use, and our great cities were closely built up, 

 that the effect of cess-pool air became note- 

 worthy. Originally the amount of plumbing 

 in ordinary dwellings was small, consisting of 

 a pump, a cess-pool, and a cistern for holding 

 rain-water. Later, sinks, baths, and boilers 

 were introduced ; and finally water-closets and 

 basins came into vogue. As population in- 

 creased and dwellings thickened, the old cess- 

 pools, which were roomy and well ventilated, 

 were replaced by smaller and tightly sealed 

 receptacles, with the ostrich-like idea that if 

 hidden below the ground their contents could 

 do no harm. It was also found less convenient 

 to empty and clean these receptacles, and hence 

 they were frequently neglected. Public sewers 

 were slowly introduced into New York. Up to 

 1849 only 72 miles were laid, against 360 miles 

 now. Many of these sewers were merely rough 

 drains, uncemented and open, and intended 

 solely to carry off kitchen - waste and soiled 

 water. When converted to receive sewage, 

 they rapidly polluted the soil, and especially 

 when tide-locked became mere elongated cess- 

 pools and gasometers for creating foul odors. 

 Under "Ring" rule, many of the sewers of 

 New York were constructed of inferior mate- 

 rial and imperfectly laid, with not enough grade 

 and insufficient flush. This condition of things 

 was supplemented by the work of the contract 

 builder, by whom a large portion of the houses 

 in our principal cities have been constructed. 

 The plumbing work, being mainly hidden from 

 view, invited these unscrupulous builders to use 

 the cheapest material and inferior workman- 

 ship. Hence, in the average houses we find 

 ill-laid drains, cheap fixtures, light - weight 

 waste-pipes full of cracks and holes, and with 

 no barrier to prevent the sewer-air from find- 

 ing direct entrance into living-rooms. It is 

 not surprising that zymotic diseases, due to 

 sanitary defects, count so largely in the 

 mortality returns. Millions of gallons of wa- 

 ter are daily being wasted in consequence 

 of leaky supply-pipes in dwellings, and ac- 

 cording to Prof. Chandler 10,000 prevent- 

 able deaths occur annually, with the usual 

 proportion of sickness, from defects in house- 

 drainage. 



Effects on Health. Where a sewer is clean, 

 ventilated, and well flushed, it does not create 

 hurtful gases. If it is laid without a proper 



grade, so that its contents stagnate and do not 

 flow easily, or if it gets choked and becomes 

 merely an "elongated cess-pool," foul gases 

 are thrown off in great volume. Decomposi- 

 tion is promoted by hot water and waste steam 

 from houses and factories. The germs of dis- 

 eases are light and almost infinitesimal, so that 

 they may be borne with the impalpable and 

 expansive sewer-gas through the house-drain 

 connections, along the line of the sewer, and 

 into living-rooms. It is these germs of dis- 

 ease of which the sewer-gas is the vehicle that 

 are so often the source of sickness. The fact 

 that so large a proportion of the mortality 

 from zymotic disease is found amid conditions 

 more or less unsanitary, shows seme connec- 

 tion between these conditions and the prevail- 

 ing malady. 



A house may be full of defective plumbing, 

 and yet have such ample area and free circu- 

 lation of air that its few inmates suffer no 

 harm, as the poison loses its potency by diffu- 

 sion. Yet the same evil conditions in a crowd- 

 ed tenement or boarding-house, French flat, 

 or dwelling of the better class, filled with up- 

 holstered furniture, with the windows and doors 

 carefully closed to exclude dust, and the atmos- 

 phere kept at a high temperature, may pro- 

 duce very different results. The greater number 

 of occupants in such houses, with the excess of 

 plumbing fixtures, tends to multiply the sources 

 of impurity and contagion, and to create out- 

 breaks of diphtheria and scarlet and typhoid 

 fever which might never visit a smaller or 

 roomier dwelling. 



Dr. Fordyce Barker, President of the New 

 York Academy of Medicine, in an address be- 

 fore that body, said, " None but physicians 

 can know how general this poison is, and how 

 positively it explains much of the disease they 

 are called upon to treat, and the many sad 

 deaths which follow." Dr. E. E. Marcy de- 

 clares that "sewer-gas in dwellings is one of 

 the most prolific sources of disease ; I find it 

 in every house." Dr. Willard Parker adds, 

 " A vast amount of sickness has its origin in 

 the influence of foul gases from sewers, carried 

 by defective plumbing into houses, and many 

 serious and often fatal affections, although not 

 so originating, are aggravated and intensified 

 by the same cause." Within three years Bag- 

 shot Park, the newly built home of the Duchess 

 of Connaught, supposed to be perfect in its 

 sanitary arrangements, has been found by Dr. 

 Playfair to be reeking with sewer-gas. In the 

 United States no less serious sanitary defects 

 have been found in public buildings, including 

 the White House at Washington, the Govern- 

 or's residence at Albany, the Municipal Build- 

 ings in Brooklyn and Newark, and public in- 

 stitutions everywhere. 



Sewer-gases, by lowering the vital force, 

 prepare the constitution to receive contagion, 

 while the same depressing influences diminish 

 the recuperative powers of the patient. Health 

 officer Mears, of San Francisco, where the 



