238 What We Lose 



cent, showed signs of consumption ; and in 100 who 

 worked in rooms of more than 600 cubic feet 

 capacity, less than 2 per cent, had spit blood. 

 Consumption is only one of the long list of evils to 

 which the town-dweller is exposed. It may be well 

 to mention that the Labrador fishermen and the 

 fishermen of the Hebrides, with plenty of fresh air, 

 are practically exempt from this disease. The 

 absence of pure air acts upon the animal economy 

 in much the same way as the withdrawal of light 

 on plants, the result being pallor and feebleness of 

 constitutional vigor. This effect ramifies in every 

 direction; the tissues of which the human body is 

 composed lose their tonicity and contractile power, 

 and even mental integrity may be more or less 

 affected. The pent-up denizens of the courts and 

 alleys of our large towns, surrounded on every side 

 by imperfect light, bad air, and the general aspects 

 of low life, necessarily degenerate in physical com- 

 petency, and their offspring is of a feeble type. 



The digestive capability of the town-dweller is of 

 a lower standard and less capable of dealing with 

 the ordinary articles of diet, than the latter. Con- 

 sequently town-dwellers live on such food as they 

 can digest without suffering bread, fish, and meat; 

 above all, the last. The sapid, tasty flesh of ani- 



