Cottage Sanitation. 
643 
(3) A cesspool, if constructed, should not be within 50 yards of 
the house, and the drain leading to it should be of glazed pipes, 
with a ventilating shaft at the upper end carried to a height of 
at least 10 feet, and not ending near a window or chimney. 
A recent writer on house sanitation gives his opinion of 
cesspools as follows : — 
“ The natural outlet for animal excretions is, of course, the laud ; and in 
the country the isolated house should so dispose of them. How this should 
Fig. 8.— Cesspool with open culvert. 
be accomplished will depend upon the “ lie ” of the gi’ound, the nature of 
the soil, and the kind of crops cultivated in the neighbourhood. 
“ Perhaps I can best illustrate my subject by a few instances. Two cases 
of diphtheria, one of them fatal, having occurred at a house, it was found, 
amongst other things, that the outflow from the kitchen sink had been con- 
ducted through the garden into a field about 20 yards o9‘. The ground 
fell rapidly, and it had, no doubt, been looked upon, at the time the arrange- 
ment was made, as a simple and effective method of sewage disposal. But, 
though the ground was steep, it was a stiff clay, and, as no provision had 
been made for distributing the sewage, in time the surface of the soil became 
saturated with the foul liquid, and during the dry season which preceded 
the outbreak of the disease, the effluvium from this open cesspool had become 
offensive in the extreme ; and when the wind was from that quarter, it had 
been particularly felt in the room occupied by the little patient who suc- 
cumbed. . . . 
“ If you must have a tank to collect and store the liquid manure, all the 
precautions I have named, by which house drains may be separated from 
common sewers, must be taken. The tank must be, if possible, a hundred 
yards away from the house, and a considerable part of the pot-pipe drain 
leading to it must be practically in the open air. This may be effected, if 
the ground favours, by bringing it near the surface in an open culvert for a 
