The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1882-09-07
Occupation ana Longevity.

"Woe to them that are at easel"
says Ca rlyle, but his anathema does
not prevent the English village par
son from OUTLYING every other class
of his countrymen, not excepting
the British farmer, whose peace of
mind can not always be reconciled
with high rents and the low price of
American wheat. Where agricul-
ture is what it should be-a contract
between man and nature, in the
United States, in Australia, and in
some parts of Switzerland-th
plow-furrow is the straightest road
to longevity; in Canada, where ma
ture is rather hard task-master, the
probabilities are in favor of such
half-indoors trades as carpentering
ami certain branches of hortlcul-
ture-summer farming, as the
Germans call it. Cold is all
antiseptic, and the best febri-
iuge, but by no means a pana-
cea, and the warmest climate on
earth is out and out preferable even
to the border-lands of the polar
zone. The average Arab outlives
the average Esquimo by twenty-five
years.
The hygienic benefit of sea-voy-
ages, too, has been amazingly exag-
gerated. Seafaring is not conducive
to longevity; the advantage of the
exercise in the rigging is more than
out weighed by the effiuvia of the
cockpit, by the pickle-diet, the I'M
natural motion, and the foul weather
misery; and, from sanitary stand
point, the sea-air itself is hardly
preferable to mountain and wood
land air. The cocoon may have
been a marine product, but our PHO
Gene ancestor was probably forest
creature.
"For what length of time would
you undertake to warrant the
health of a seaman~ Varnhagen
asked a Dutch marine doctor.
''That depends on the length of
his furlough," replied the frank
Hollander, and it will require centu
ries of reform to redeem our cities
from the odium of a similar reproach.
In victuals and vitality towns con-
sumo the boarded stores of the
country, and only the garden sub
| urbs of a few North American cities
are hygienically selt-supporting.
Permanent indoor work is slow
suicide, and between the various
shop-trades and sedentary occupa-
tons the difference in this respect is
only one of degree. Factories stand
at the bottom of the scale, and the
dust and vapor generating ones, be-
low zero; the weaver's chances to
reach the average age of his species
have to be expressed by a negative
quantity. In France, where the
tabulation of comparative statistics
is carried further than anywhere
else, the healthfulness of the princi-
pal town trades has been ascertained
to decrease in the following
order: House-building, huckster-
ing, hot-bed gardening (florists),
carpenter and brick-mason trades,
street-paving, STRENGTHENING, sewer
cleaning, blacksmiths, artisan smiths
| (silver, copper and tin concerns),
shoemaking, paper-making, glass
blowing, tailor, butcher, house
painter, baker, cook, stone-masons,
and lapidaries. operatives of paint
and lead factories, weavers, steel
griuders-the wide difference be-
tween brick and stone masons being
due to the lung-infesting dust of
lapidary work, which, though an
outdoor occupation, is nearly as I'M
healthy as steel-grinding. Lead
paint makers have to alter
nate their work with jobs
in the tlnshop, and, after all
can rarely stand it for more than
fifteen years; needle-grinders gener-
ally succumb after twelve or four
years.-Dr. FeliG L. OSaOdld IN Pop
lar Science Monthly.