, 1889-08-24

Look at me-"
The speaker was IA man Of medium
height and rather inclined to stoutness.
Bis hair is turning gray, but his eyes
were bright and CHEEKY and his face
glowed with the hue of health.
'How old am II"
The writer placed his age at 40 years
at a venture, though 3s years would
have been apparently an equally close
guess.
'That's what most people take me for.
l am nearly 40 years old, and have spent
the last seventeen years Of my life in the
city lead house. Do l look sicklyT'
KILLING BAD DOORS.
Albert White, the keeper of the city
morgue, was discussing the death of
Joseph Fogarty, for several years the
assistant keeper, and was Indignantly
denying the widely credited report that
constant intercourse with the bodies of
the dead had evil effects upon the health
Of the living.
81 have employed hundreds of men
and women here" continued the keeper,
'since / nave had charge of this depart
81 1iAa AaN0 IAtNGA Ntk hdL OllG hlt
from the effects of handling lead bodies
or being constantly among them. Some
have died, it is true, but they have only
themselves to blame for it. have had
seven assistant keepers. Fogarty was
the last. My first assistant was the
only man who contracted a disease here,
and / am not quite sure that this is the
place he caught it. Inc day he came
down with smallpox, though we never
had n case of smallpox in the building
to our knowledge. He recovered and is
now an attendant in the City Insane
asylum. Fogarty died from heart dis
ease. He was born with it. Why, every
week during the college sessions for
years DIR. Janeway would ave Joe go
up before his class for examination.
He had n triple murmuring of the heart,
so he called it, and he was one of the
only cases ever known. When he had
his leg taken off there was a consulta-
ton of twenty or thirty big doctors to
decide whether they would give him
ether or not. They concluded he would
die If they didn't, and sc they gave it to
him and he recovered"
As the keeper talked the wind shifted
to the east and the breeze that brought
miniature white caps 10 the waves that
slashed under the city dead house also
carried into the office a faint odor from
the long, low room that extends over the
river and where the bodies are kept.
"Smell that odorY' went on Mr.. White,
throwing wide open the door. "Well,
that's all we ever get, and there's moth
ing unhealthy in that. It's not alto
gether pleasant, l know, but if you didn't
know what it came from you'd hardly
notice it. We pack the bodies in red
carborate of lime. That absorbs the ami
NAL moisture. Then we keep the stone
floor always wet. That carries off the
odor as fast as it is made. That is the
way we manage to keep healthy"
but isn't work in the morgue calcu-
lated to affect a mans mind more thar
it does his bodyr"
"Why should it any more than the
work of an undertaken? Look at me"
rejoined the keeper with a touch of par
donable pride in his tones. 81 think my
mind is as healthy as most mems, and
I've spent most n lifetime here. After
a mans used to the work there is moth
ing excessively unpleasant about it.
NO EPE EVER COMMITTED SUICIDE.
81 nave never had a helper go insane.
1t doesn't affect their moral natures in
the least so far as | can find out. never
knew it to affect any ones particularly.
We never had a helper commit suicide,
and / never knew of a mans killing
himself In or near the morgue.
"Do you nave any trouble in getting
helpersy'
~ can get more than / need. There
are always n dozen or more applications
than there are vacancies, and when 1
discharge a man / am overrun with APP
plications within twenty-four hours. No,
/ tell you, the morgue is a healthy place
to work in, public opinion to the con-
trary Notwithstanding, and a man who
takes care of himself can live here as
long as he can anywhere"
The late DIR. Frank II. Hamilton, who
won a national reputation during the
fatal illness of President Garfield, agreed
with Mr.. White in every particular, and
even went farther.
"The effects of n rank growth of vege-
~tation," wrote the doctor, "are much
more pernicious to human life and health
than the decay of animal structures. In
the great Partisan slaughter houses,
especially Montfaucon, where annually
are brought 10000 to 5000 dead, dying
or worn out horses, dogs, cats and other
domestic animals, every portion of whose
bodies was there worked over and used
up for various economic purposes, the
workmen enjoy as good health as the
same class of laborers in any other occu-
patton.
I'm New York" he continued, where
large slaughter houses are scattered here
and there along the water fronts, among
the poorest novels and tenement houses,
l am told that there does not exist any
more sickness than is usually found
among the same number of poor in all
the crowded tenemen districts of the
city. Yet there is not q slaughter house
In New York in which more or less OF
the blood from the slaughtered animals,
with fragments of flesh, etc, do not lie
in or about or under the floor, there to
undergo putrefaction. The mortuary
and general sanitary statistics of Chicago
will probably not show that it is any