272 Wisconsin state agricultural society. 
mal schools, a professorship of physiology and practical hygiene, 
and no pupil should be considered qualified to go forth and teach 
who was not only well instructed in the “ facts, principles and dic¬ 
tates of sanitary science, but had also a proper appreciation of their 
value.” The people need facts — facts fortified and made cogent 
by figures; facts demonstratable from persistent and ever active 
causes, and gathered from many localities. They need to be taught 
that consumption has its cause often in soil moisture', that the ex¬ 
ternal cause of typhoid fever is an animal poison introduced into 
the system through infected water, or foul gases emanating from 
decaying animal matter, and that the death of their dear ones, so 
often resignedly attributed to Divine Providence, is the result of 
their own sin of neglect; the legitimate outcome of a neglected 
priv}^; an open cesspool; a disgusting pigsty; a contaminated well 
or a festering ground surface near the dwelling, which has been 
drinking in the kitchen slops for years, foul gases from which have 
been forced by moving currents of air into and through all the apart¬ 
ments of the home. 
Another part of the duty of this board, indicated by the law, is 
the “ study of the vital statistics of the state, with a view to making 
intelligent and profitable use of the collected records of sickness 
and death among the people.” 
The successful study of sanitary science must always be based 
upon mortuary facts. These can only be obtained by aid of legal 
enactments which shall be compulsory to a degree that shall secure 
the necessary care and labor. 
An intelligent author says: “ One of the first great objects of 
sanitary organization is to watch the death rate — to watch it not 
only over a city or parish, but in detail; to watch it in regard to 
difference of sex, age and circumstances; to watch it from month to 
month, and even from week to week; to watch it as affected by dif¬ 
ferent diseases, and particularly what are termed epidemic diseases, 
and such diseases as are believed to be preventable, and this done, 
to make known from time to time the results to those who are 
chiefly concerned in sanitary evils, so as to effectually bring home 
to the dwellers in darkness, ignorance and disease, the immense 
significance of the facts taught by these figures.” 
It is evident this cannot be done without complete and accurate 
returns of mortuary facts from all parts ot the state. Hence a pri- 
