The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1878-09-05
VOL. VII.
AUsrIN AND TIE DYING CITIES

AUSCIN AND TIE DYING CITIES
1t is a great pity that the STATESMAN
through past years has persisteutly
urged the necessity for sewage pipes
from the Capitol even to the Colorado.
We preached about health and cleanli-
ness. and always in vain. But see the
effectl When q disease that delights
in filth begins to prey upon distant
cities, Austin's rulers become the VIC
tins of an agony of terror. They fly
to quarantine for safety, even when
disease is thousand miles away, and
when few believe that Anstin would
suffer if Thousand victims of yellow
fever were brought here to die. When
at least one sewer along the
the Avenue, where population is dens-
est, mi Lht have been made, the clty's
guardians did nothing. The STATESMAN
continued its lectures. 1t still urged
the necessity for underground drain
age, the want of which, at this hour,
makes Memphis scene of fearful, pit
liable desolation and death.
A. filthy bayou or sluggish creek,
running north and parallel with the
Mississippi, which runs south, and finally
discharging itself into the muTky little
Wolf rlver, at the mouth of which
Memphis stands on the banks of the
great drain of the continent-this foul
bayou is the only sewer and cesspool
of the place. 1t is uncovered, save
for short distance along its tortuous,
sinking course. There are no sewers,
and all the refuse and drainage of a
city of $4,000 people are discharged
into this bayou which bisects the city.
Memphis is well supplied with water,
but this is only used in washing the
cutters and sending the bilgewater
from five thousand kitchens, dram
shops, vaults and cesspools into Bayou
Gayoso. 1t is pltiful that the last
Spanish Governor of Louisiana should
have his name forever associated with
filth and foul contsgion that sim
mer in the sunshine and are yellow as
gold in rottenness and memorable
evermore as the Bayou of Death.
The STATESMAN has discovered in
Austin no such drain of rottenness as
this. Pollution here is fastened in the
hillsides. 1t is hidden in pits. These
are constantly multiplied, and it is not
yellow fever that will climb the heights
on which Austin, famed by winds as
fresh and pure as an angels breath,
repeses IN mellow sunlight. There is
no foul bayou, as in Memphis, and no
sluggish, filthy river, as at Grenade.
Austin Is not in the midst of q
marsh fifteen feet above the gulf,
like New Orleans and we hardly be-
lieve that all the sources of filth and
malarial disorders in Austin can do
more than produce those terrible cases
of typhoid fever that prey upon pee-
pie who sleep near the foul alleys.
But the STATESMAN constantly pre-
sented the necessity that impels us to
make Austin pre-eminently healthful.
We sought to attract to this city civil
lied people accustomed to the Comforts
and decencies of life of the most civil
ICED cities. We talked day after day
on these subjects, never exagger-
ating, but always urging the
necessity for underground drain.
age indispensable to healthfulness.
1t is not astonishing when Yellow
Jack landed in the valley of the Mis-
sissippi and began to kill people in
haling filth and drinking poison from
cracked cisterns into which cesspools
drain-it is not astonishing that our
local rulers were greatly alarmed. They
saw how they had blundered. They
knew that amends must be made fol
neglect of duty. They fear, if the
plague comes, that, having failed in the
discharge of plain duty to protect
the people against common malaria
typhoid feyers, they will be held
responsible for every death caused by
the yellow infection. Therefore this
sudden and extraordinary zeal; there
fore this absurd quarantine and thiI
awful dread of water, of popular
cleanliness and Of surface drainage. i
is a great pity We talked so much
about sewage. We had reference t.
common fever, while these good peo
ple, who rule the town, have hysteri,
when Yellow Jacks horrible name i:
reverently mentioned. Never did {
body of sane men perform as man!
needless, absurd and incomprehensibl
gymnastics in civic legislation. II tn
world did not understand it a
panic, Austin would be ruined
by them. No Odd Fellows tenn
pie would be erected in city tina
needs quarantine when yellow fever i
1000 miles away. No State universlt,
will ever crown these msjestic hill
with temples of learning and taste ant
art if people dare not bathe or vast
water IN gutter when yellow
Jack holds horrible high carnival Il
the cities and lowlands of Mississippi
But the world measures accurately tn
wisdom of eity's rulers, and non
have ever labored more earnestl,
70 serve, while really destroying
I the fame and fortunes OF q cap
ital than these of Austin. Blu
whatever of harm they have don
is in > great measure counteracted b
the published assertions of many Of tn
most learned members of the medics
profession. Meanwhile, that the pol
icy OF the city's rulers may be changed
that they may not persist in needles
practices ruinous alike to trade, to th
Il