DUST AND ITS DANGERS. 



There are those masses of " water dust " which 

 we call clouds and fogs and steam. There is 

 the scriptural dust, bearing, according to ortho- 

 dox traditions, such a close relationship to the 

 origin and endings of mundane existence. Col- 

 loquially, there is a form of "dust" too which to 

 win many a mortal seems to forget both his 

 origin and his destiny, yielding at last that dust 

 which he has won to be himself resolved into 

 that to which he was foreordained. 



But if we plant our standard on Webster's 

 first choice, and let dust be for us " Fine dry 

 particles of earth or other matter so attenuated 

 that it may be raised and wafted by the wind," 

 we shall not be apt to stray too far from the 

 practical, nor fall foul of either primordial or 

 ecclesiastical or pecuniary dust. 



Simple, common, omnipresent every-day dust 

 then, the bane of the tidy housekeeper, the 

 torment of the cleanly citizen who goes upon 

 the streets in ill-kept towns, wafted upon every 

 breeze without, stirred by every footfall within, 

 this is the humble but significant subject to 

 which, not without reason, it is believed, these 

 pages are devoted. 



