12 



care of the pence and the pounds will take care of themselves." 

 After you have got a good current of air regularly going through 

 the cellar, then give it some light. Oh what an enemy to immor- 

 ality, to deadly influences of all sorts, spiritual and physical, is 

 the pure sunlight ! Let the sunlight in and through the cellar if 

 you would have the best protection to the wife and children at 

 home. If typhoid fever and dysentery are preferred, then keep 

 right on and let alone a dark, damp, and dangerous cellar. When 

 you have let the^air and light into your cellar, then aid the sun to 

 make it lighter and sweeter by thoroughly washing the ceiling 

 and sides with lime wash (whitewash). The hme will not only 

 protect the timbers from decay and fire, but it will destroy some 

 of the virulence of many deadly gases. It will help also to find 

 the rat holes, the decaying timber, block of wood, vegetable or 

 meat, these powerful farmer's poisons. 



But a more visible and odorous farmer's poison is to be found 

 hack of the shed and the kitchen and in the barn-yard. Around 

 how many farmers' buildings — clear round I mean — can you go 

 this afternoon, within ten feet of them, without holding your nose 

 or stepping into filth over shoes ? And yet these very sights and 

 smells are preparing perhaps some of this audience for the ty- 

 phoid fever, which may take a life, certainly will take all the 

 strength of the family to care for, and possibly all the earnings 

 for a year. A farmer, mechanic, or any other man or woman con- 

 trolling a homestead in New England is cnlpable, negligently cul- 

 pable, if they allow a stinking cess-pool, barn-yard or anything of 

 the sort on their premises. Such a thing is not a necessity, or 

 even an excusable negligence. For but a small quantity of coal 

 or wood ashes or loam, if only perfectly dry, is a complete disin- 

 fectant for this poison ; it will absorb incredible amounts. 



And the absolute money profit of saving the drainage of the 

 house is wonderful. For in most of our houses it is safe to say 

 that during the year two barrels of soft soap are used and a num- 

 ber of pounds of hard soap. Here then are perhaps fifty pounds 

 of soluble potash which are only of use to enrich the coarse weeds 

 ab(jut the sink drain. Why not keep a barrel or box or two of 

 dry earth close by the sink drain, and every morning and night 

 let a few quarts be thrown in to absorb this most common and en- 



