186 MEMOIR OF FLEEMING JENKIN 



ItslX^ his sanitary work, or in the view of benefiting 

 tions. poorer men as with his labours for technical educa- 

 tion, he ' pitched into it ' (as he would have said 

 himself) with the same headlong zest. I give in 

 the Appendix 1 a letter from Colonel Fergusson, 

 which tells fully the nature of the sanitary work 

 and of Fleeming's part and success in it. It will 

 be enough to say here that it was a scheme of 

 protection against the blundering of builders and 

 the dishonesty of plumbers. Started with an eye 

 rather to the houses of the rich, Fleeming hoped 

 his Sanitary Associations would soon extend their 

 sphere of usefulness and improve the dwellings 

 of the poor. In this hope he was disappointed ; 

 but in all other ways the scheme exceedingly 

 prospered, associations sprang up and continue 

 to spring up in many quarters, and wherever tried 

 they have been found of use. 



Here, then, was a serious employment ; it has 

 proved highly useful to mankind ; and it was begun 

 besides, in a mood of bitterness, under the shock 

 of what Fleeming would so sensitively feel — the 

 death of a whole family of children. Yet it was 

 gone upon like a holiday jaunt. I read in Colonel 

 Fergusson's letter that his schoolmates bantered 

 him when he began to broach his scheme ; so did 



^ This was the appendix to * Papers^ Literary ^ Scientific y etc., by 

 the late Fleeming Jenkin, F.R.S.,' to which this Memoir was 

 originally prefixed. 



