135 
EIGHTH REPORT. 
of surface waters and shallow wells, but that even when all practicable 
means to arrive at this end have been employed, such sources of supply 
are to be viewed with suspicion, and the health of communities still 
farther guarded in many instances by filtering the water. 
In order to reduce the danger of surface water becoming unwhole¬ 
some, every household, every community, every city, every factory, every 
slaughter house, etc., should be required to destroy or render harmless 
and unobjectionable its own refuse, before it is permitted to enter 
streams or other surface water bodies, and also before it is distributed 
in such a manner as to be dangerous or annoying through the action 
of the wind or in other ways. The aim in view in this connection, is to 
abate the menaces to life and health, and to comfort and happiness, 
incident to the growth of communities, and reap the benefits of civiliza¬ 
tion without augmenting the evils that flesh is heir to. 
The subjects touched on in this brief essay, have a bearing on and 
are ultimately to a grave extent dependent on a still larger problem 
incident to the spread of civilization, namely the conservation of the 
volume and regularly of flow of streams, by sane forestry and agricul¬ 
tural methods. 
University of Michigan. 
