Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1888-11-07
Guardian Of the Tome

The assertion has become almost COM
uocplace that woman is the natural guardian
Of the home The more she is prohibited
from all external spheres the more she IS
recognized ii her aspect of home keeper. II,
then, she Is responsible for the home, she
should look at i. in all It's aspects. The hus-
land usually spends there but few hours Of
his waking day, while the wife spends but
few hours away from Il It Is she, therefore,
who should study the material SIDE of the
home, and I'll the constant changes brought
to it by the changing customs of society and
by new mechanical appliances. 1t is there
fore quite proper that it should De woman
who, Ike Dr. Lucy Hall, has spent q large
part OF the summer vacation il inspecting
the farm houses Of the New England, the
middle and toe western states with refer
ence TO their sanitary condition What she
has done is only beginning, for she ex-
an2ined only sixty-fve farm houses in all,
but sine tried to select what might be re-
garded as ordinary and typical in each
region, and she carefully tabulated her re-
suits More than half these houses. she re-
ports, are built on wet clay SOILS; most OF the
Cellars arc damp or wet, and more than half
(j5 per cent? are too closely shaded and
the sunlight excluded
In New England and the middle States the
sleeping rooms are almost wholly on the first
floor. and this is very largely the case in the
western states also. La New England barns
and stables averaged rot more than fifty feet
from the house in the cases examined. In II
per cent of the New England farm houses
examined the Stops were thrown from the
back door, and this also il 40 per cent. Of
those Of tho middle states. 1t is TO be re-
tnembered-though J am not sure that DR..
Hall spoke of thiS-that many OF the New
ENGLAND farm houses examined may very
probably have been on hillsides, where what
ever was thrown from the door may have
been deposited further from the house than
il tine sane thing had been done on level
surface. There is PerflOus temptation in a
Geclivity. At any rate 90 Per cent. OF the
New E--land farm houses had furnished
cases CT iuac disease and diphlherla and s.
per cent OF typhoid fever. No one con say
what proportion Of this illness could have
been avsrred by better sanitary conditions
but it IS certain that part Of 1t could, and
the person who his tho best opportunity to
consider 1t closely is the mistress OF the home.
! knew a case in western town where
there were repeated cases of fever in house
Physician, health officers and plumbers had
eli made careful examination, and could fCd
nothing 10 explain the source OF the trouble.
at last the mistress Of the house, driven to
despair, carried q lantern down into the eel
lar, resolving to examine for herself everv
square inch of the wall, and satisfy herself
that all was right. After a long, unavailing
search she came upon a very few drops OF
foul wafer oozing between two bricks, Caus-
ing tho wnl to be opened at that point, she
found a broken pipe which the plumbers had
failed to detect, and which was enough to
account for everything. This being repaired
the fever disappeared, and the health OF the
family was restored by the energy and thor
oughness OF a mother.-T. W. Higginson in
Earper's Bazaar.