considerable amount of rheumatism, the disease of farmers, would 

 be done away with if people would sleep in the second story of 

 the house. But hear what a sensible woman says on this point : 



"If every farmer in the land could be made to see that the mi- 

 asma which floats invisible in the upholding sunlight of noonday 

 is precipitated by the chill of night, just as the earth in a glass of 

 muddy water goes to the bottom when at rest, and that he, sleep- 

 ing on the ground floor is aptly represented by a pin lying in that 

 layer of mud, he would conquer his aversion to going up stairs, 

 and once having tasted the superior charms of a fresh airy bed- 

 room, away from the smoke and the smells of the roasting and 

 broiling and trying and baking which must be done in every 

 kitchen, he would never be induced again to sleep below stairs." 



Another of the poisons of the farmer's life is pork — P-O-R-K ! 

 Webster defines pork as " the flesh of the hog, fresh or salted, and 

 used as a food ." Perhaps a definition of pork ought to read some- 

 thing like this : Pork is the diseased adipose tissue or fat of the 

 American hog. It is the more and more diseased, and hence 

 richer in flavor for food to men, as the animal is allowed to hve 

 on the rotten and filthy excrements of man and beast, and to eat 

 all the indigestible and refuse food which no other animal will eat, 

 or smell of but once. If the food called swill is fermented by pu- 

 trefactive decomposition, the hog is more greedy to get it, and en- 

 velops himself all the more deeply in the luscious and dehcious 

 fat. Exercise, sunlight, fresh air, cleanliness and healthy diet, 

 are not the proper food for fat stuffs. The confinement in barn 

 cellars, darkness, close pens, filth, the refuse of slaughter houses, 

 glue factories, and dirty manufactories, give a richness and dainty 

 flavor to the articles of human food known as bacon, ham, lard, 

 sausages, salt pork, head cheese, liver, and so on. The hog is the 

 nest or generating place of the trichina and the elegant tape 

 worm, which ultimately take up their residence in the bodies of 

 men and women. He is also the source of lard, or the diseased 

 fat reduced to a soft solid and used extensively in cookery to pre- 

 pare the common but innutritions pie crust. Lard is also of'con- 

 stant use in the frying pan — an American delight. Its great val- 

 ue here is that it boils at so high a temperature when food is 

 cooked in it that the tender and juicy albumen is dried up and 



