How to secure them, 123 



his paper to which I can demur, except it be his comparison of 

 the germs of disease to the fairies. Mr. Chairman, I have 

 never seen a fairy, but I have seen the germs of disease, and if 

 Mr. Gray is in doubt as to their existence I shall be very happy 

 to show them to him at any time. In Belfast we have much 

 too high a death-rate, the two principal causes of which are (i) 

 the condition of the sub-soil, and (2) the occupations of the 

 people. We cannot do much to modify these, but no doubt 

 other conditions, such as house sanitation, can be modified. I 

 thoroughly agree with Mr. Gray that what we need above all 

 things is to arouse public interest and attention. How ex- 

 ceedingly simple are the principles of house sanitation ; they lie 

 in a nutshell. They are the merest ABC work : the great 

 trouble is to get them applied. I hope all here will remember 

 what Mr. Gray told us to-night, that we already have the 

 powers. The Public Health Act puts it in the power of every 

 householder to compel his landlord to put his house in a good 

 sanitary condition, and it is our own fault if we allow these 

 matters to be neglected. Two very important points are to 

 have proper traps and sufficient flushing. If these are in good 

 order most other things take care of themselves. We ought to 

 go in for a four-gallon flush ; some houses have very much less 

 than two gallons. We very often overlook the fact that the 

 materials in the trap may themselves give rise to gases, but 

 that can be prevented if flushing is adequate. The condition 

 of the jorbox is much neglected. I am greatly struck with the 

 prevalence of typhoid fever amongst domestic servants, and I 

 believe that this is partly due to bad gases passing into sculleries 

 from the jorbox. Apart from the question of actual disease, it 

 is one of our maxims when we find people never well that it 

 would be a good thing to look to the drains. No doubt 

 breathing bad air is one of the most potent sources of being 

 constantly more or less in a low condition. We should have 

 some means of compulsorily inspecting houses. As far as I 

 know there is no public authority for anything like a regular 

 inspection of houses. There is nothing more astonishing than 



