THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



445 



fats, another for grease, and others for 

 paper, tin cans, bottles, etc. 



The garbage from 13 of the canton- 

 ments is fed to hogs. Experience has 

 shown that the garbage incident to the 

 feeding of from 10 to 15 men will feed 

 one hog. On this ration it has been found 

 that the hogs take on a pound of flesh a 

 day for the first 150 days. The garbage 

 from a cantonment is, therefore, sufficient 

 to feed approximately 4,000 hogs, which 

 would show a gain of' more than 9,000 

 tons of meat per year for the 13 canton- 

 ments, if the stock is kept up to the maxi- 

 mum number. In the three remaining 

 cantonments the garbage is reduced to 

 grease, which is used in the manufacture 

 of soap, candles, and glycerine. 



The bones gathered will first have the 

 grease extracted and then will be ground 

 into bone-meal for fertilizer. The bottles 

 at each cantonment will be sorted, steril- 

 ized and used again for commercial pur- 

 poses. It is estimated that each canton- 

 ment will yield about five tons of waste 

 paper a day. 



The waste materials from the National 

 Army cantonments and embarkation 

 camps have been sold to contractors for 

 $446,000. In addition to this, the stable 

 manure has been sold for $198,000, mak- 

 ing a total of $644,000. Thus not only 

 has there been a salvage of nearly $700,- 

 000 from wastes, but an additional sav- 

 ing of $700,000, which, under the old sys- 

 tem, would have been expended in the in- 

 stallation of incinerators. To this must 

 be added the saving of $362,000 in the 

 annual cost of operating these inciner- 

 ators. 



HOW DIRT HAS BEEN OUTLAWED 



If an army marches on its stomach, it 

 keeps itself in health by its water supply. 

 Nowhere else is cleanliness such a virtue 

 as in the life of the soldier. Until that 

 lesson was driven home by the ever- 

 higher ratio of deaths from disease than 

 from gun-fire, the value of water, good 

 water and plentiful good water, was not 

 appreciated. But when wars were over 

 and statistics analyzed it was found that 

 more men were killed and injured in 

 their battle with uncleanliness than with 

 the foe in front of them. 



So dirt was outlawed. Uncle Sam pro- 

 vides in his big cantonments, his training 

 and concentration camps, a water supply 

 capable of meeting any demand that the 

 ends of cleanliness may make. The story 

 of the construction of the water systems 

 of the several cantonments may be told 

 in general terms by describing the system 

 at Camp Dix. 



The supply at that camp comes mainly 

 from New Lisbon, more than three miles 

 distant. It is taken from the north branch 

 of Rancocas Creek, the headwaters of 

 which drain wooded, uncultivated land, 

 on which cedar, scrub oak and pine grow. 

 The soil is black and white sand, and 

 through it the water percolates into the 

 drainage substrata. In many places the 

 cedar predominates, and the water com- 

 ing in contact with its needles and roots 

 is given a slight amber tinge and acquires 

 a faint but pleasant cedar taste. 



GIANT TRENCHING MACHINES USED TO 

 LAY WATER MAINS 



The three pumps which lift the water 

 out of the creek and drive it three miles 

 across country and up into the huge 

 storage tanks of the camp have each a 

 daily capacity of 1,500,000 gallons of 

 water. Each pump is driven by a steam 

 turbine which occupies scarcely more 

 space than the chassis of an army motor 

 truck, but which is powerful enough to 

 do the work of a thousand men. Every 

 muiute of the day and night, it drives a 

 thousand gallons of water up a figurative 

 hill 245 feet high, to the top of the high- 

 est water tank in Camp Dix ; and it has 

 to fly around at the rate of 83 revolutions 

 a second to do its work. 



A 16-inch cast-iron water main, more 

 than three miles long, carries the water 

 to the camp. Giant trenching machines, 

 walking forward at the rate of 120 feet 

 an hour, dug a ditch up hill and down 

 dale four feet deep and 20 inches w r ide. 

 After the trenching machine came the 

 pipe-layers and caulkers, and behind 

 them the trench-refilling machine, which 

 brought up the rear of the procession, 

 with a filled ditch dragging out behind it. 



A giant steel tank 127 feet high, on the 

 camp site, holds 200,000 gallons of water 

 and each of three reserve wooden tanks 



