11 



duce decomposition in animals is a little mysterious, but there is no doubt about 

 the fact, and probably more typhoid fever has originated from putridity in cel- 

 lars than from the decomposition of vegetable matter in some neighboring- 

 swamp. The malarial atmosphere from the swamp is greatly diluted with pure 

 air before it reaches the house, and is inhaled in homeopathic doses, but that 

 from the cellar, unless conducted off artificially, permeates the whole dwelling. 

 We have been in some houses where the odor of rotten cabbages and turnips 

 was so perceptible that we felt we were inhaling poison. 



If farmers must stow their roots in the cellars of their houses, they should at 

 least provide some way of escape for the noxious gases there generated. For- 

 tunately this is easily done if the chimney extends, as it always should, to the 

 cellar bottom. No ventilating tube was ever invented equal to a chimney, and 

 no better deodorizers can be found than smoke, soot and creosote. If a register 

 be placed in the chimney near the top of the cellar, the foul air will escape 

 through it, instead of finding vent through the doors and cracks into all parts 

 of the house. Similar registers should connect the kitchen, and indeed every 

 room of the house, with the chimneys. The problem of thorough ventilation 

 can be solved in no other way, so simply, so cheaply, and so effectually. If 

 there is a sink, or cess-pool, or water closet, that is breeding miasm and death, 

 the simple remedy is to connect it by means of a pipe or tube, with the chim- 

 ney. The current of poisonous gas will, in every case, be found rushing up 

 this tube, and the smoke and soot of the chimney will effectually destroy all its 

 contaminating influences. 



Finally, let the farm house be built and furnished simply. We do not look 

 for elegance and display in the homes of yeomen, but we do expect and ought 

 to find neatness, refinement and comfort. Simplicity is not incompatible with 

 good taste, in fact it is the highest evidence of it. The true gentleman is simple 

 in his manners, simple in his dress, in his equipage, his house, furniture, style 

 of living, and in all his fixings. It is the upstarts, the Jim Fisks, the suddenly 

 rich, who want to make a dash. We expect no such snobbing from the tillers 

 of the soil who earn an honest livelihood by patient toil. The farmer, how- 

 ever, is entitled to a comfortable home, and his house should be commodious 

 and tasteful, without being ostentatious and expensive. We have many such 

 in this county, and we would like to mention some of them as model homes, 

 but this would make an invidious distinction. 



With all outward and inward appliances for a comfortable home, we must 

 ever remember that home is where the heart is. A shanty, with love in it, is 

 better than a palace filled with envy and strife. We have spoken of our earth- 

 ly home as a type of our final and blessed abode, but as love is the secret of the 

 joy of heaven so is it the mainspring of the exquisite delights to be found in 

 the circle that surrounds the family board. Not every farmer that builds a 

 spacious and convenient house for his family, succeeds in making that family 

 comfortable. Together with the building of his house he must build himself 

 on the solid foundation of all manly virtues, and together with the culture of 

 his farm he must cultivate all kindly affections. Nor should these affections be 



