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crust of lard ! If we only would take in tlieir place potatoes with 

 milk, cream or butter, cooked apples, stewed, dried and fresh 

 fruits ! If we only would begin the season with and use much 

 more largely fresh and uncooked fruits at every meal, beginning 

 in June with strawberries, and ending in November with grapes ! 

 Could not all tbis be done with precious little outlay to you, gen- 

 tlemen and ladies ? If it were very generally done then we 

 would predict the farmer's millenium as not far distant. 



And how would the mothers and sisters meet the change in 

 their daily work ? Would they not prefer to go into the garden 

 and pick, and even in some farms help to cultivate many of the 

 fruits, rather than roast themselves over the kitchen stove in the 

 stench of the frying pan ? And the raising of more fruit of all 

 kinds, which I am sure almost every farmer can double in quanti- 

 ty, is not of interest simply for your own food. Our mechanics, 

 tradespeople, school teachers, and other professional folk, will 

 most happily exchange much of the hog, pork and salt meat for 

 fruit, when you can afford it to them at reasonable rates. 



Ladies and gentlemen of this time-honored society, I beseech 

 of you to turn your attention to raising more fruit, not only that 

 which must be cooked, but the delicious fruit which only needs to 

 be picked and eaten. Then our phpsiologists will insure you less 

 dysentery, less cholera infantum and majorum, fewer fevers, and, 

 in fine, better bowels the year round. 



A most reliable aad sure poison for farmers is the miasma or 

 poisonous vapor generated in the refuse tnatter about the house 

 and the barn. And this is a more common and destructive pois- 

 on than either of the others just mentioned. And most of our 

 fevers are caused by the noxious exhalations or germs rising from 

 decaying organic matter. Till within a few years the air contained 

 in the upper few feet of the soil has never been brought to notice. 

 And this does not mean simply that air is cold and damp on the 

 ground, but that the upper few feet of soil — say six — contains 

 much carbonic acid and other poisonous gases. A writer who 

 is probably the first living authority on this subject says : " A few 

 feet under the surface there is akeady as much carbonic acid as 

 there is in the worst ventilated human dwellings." Now those 

 gases are not only out in the fields and at a distance from the 



