CONVICT LABOK FOR ROAD WORK. 101 
purchased at almost any hardware store for a sum not exceeding 
SI. 50. Such receptacles are water-tight and very serviceable, and 
when left covered remain free from flies and do not give off disa- 
greeable odors. To prevent them from becoming unnecessarily foul 
they should be washed and scalded with boiling water at frequent 
intervals. As moisture is the immediate cause of souring, if the 
garbage be drained and wrapped in paper before being placed in the 
can it will not smell in hot weather, the can will not become dirty, 
and will not require emptying more than once or twice a week. 
This expedient will also prevent the garbage from freezing and 
sticking to the can in cold weather. 
At many camps, especially those in the South, garbage is collected 
in open pails in the kitchen and fed to hogs. The latter are often- 
times allowed to run loose around the camps and even have been seen 
inside the dining quarters of prisoners. The garbage is thrown into 
a trough or on the surface of the ground at some convenient spot not 
far from the kitchen door and left to the hogs to dispose of. Such 
primitive conditions should be tolerated no longer at any convict 
camp, and hogs, if kept at all, should be penned securely at a distance 
not less than one quarter of a mile from the camp. 
Small, open garbage pails in the kitchens scarcely can be avoided, 
and are not objectionable if the kitchens are screened from flies and 
the pails emptied and cleaned after each meal. Camps have been 
seen, however, where the kitchens were not screened and garbage 
pails were hung at convenient angles on nails outside the kitchen 
windows. Most of the garbage dumped' through the windows would 
fall into the pails, but some would drop down the sides of the build- 
ings to the ground. 
At many camps with plenty of vacant land surrounding them 
garbage is carried once a day to a spot 100 yards or more from the 
camp and water supply and is buried in shallow trenches. Under 
these conditions there can be no serious objection to this method of 
disposal. The trenches should be from 12 to 18 inches in depth and 
the garbage spread over the bottom in a layer about 2 inches thick 
and covered with earth immediately. 
Garbage pits are in use at a few camps. They consist usually of 
a hole about 3 feet wide, 5 feet long, and 4 feet deep. The top is 
covered first with boards and then with earth, and a small trap door 
is constructed through which the garbage and slops are dumped. 
When the camp is moved the space which remains is filled with 
earth. Garbage pits are not as satisfactory as the shallow trenches 
already described. They are more liable to pollute the ground water, 
and their contents may remain in the ground unchanged for long 
periods of time and be uncovered by animals. They should be 
avoided whenever better methods of disposal are possible. 
