Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-08-10
SMELLS THAT KILL.
You Can Execute a Man With an
0dor if You Apply it Properly.
BAD AIR SUPPLY In TRAVELLING.
Every Active Source Of Ferment in Food
Should be Avoided.
THE DANGER IN FINE FLOUR BREAD

small significance in the attention scientific
men are giving the matter of longevity. Few
subjects are more worthy the study of
learned body than that to which the Society
of Hygiene at Vienna seriously addresses
itself-the art Of attaining long life. 1t has
sent letters to all the old men in Germany
and Austria Hungary inquiring about their
habits, occupations, recreations, clothing,
etc.. hoping to gain light on the conditions
which prolong mans years.
find 50 many ailing this summer, old
and young, who were hardy and careless
hitherto. find so many active people re-
trenching their expenditure Of effort by in
stinct, that it seems in the way to look up
few of the causes which sap our vitality, In
town and out. The great matters Of DRAIN
age and clean streets are enforcing tnem-
selves by malignant lessons, but there are
other causes, quite within our reach, which
may each cost life, or the strength Of life.
So great gift is to be preserved at cost Of
vigilance unceasing. and the delightful
wonder Is that we live through and past 30
many risks.
EXPERIENCE ON A SOUND STEAMER
Hur.ying northward to cooler, purer airs
on one of the smaller Sound boats, chosen
for its convenience to my route, the only
stateroom to be had was one on the main
deck opening from the ladies' cabin. 1t
| was late before that even could be assigned,
and its disagreeable odor was supposed due
to Its being shut up, though 1t only WED
| with that which had pervaded the cabin
| for the carelessly kept dressing room.
Opening the window did not seem to help
| it much, but was so tired with the day.
work that while thinking "I must get out
of this" dropped asleep. Not for long.
| I have been known TO sleep through q
thunder storm, but never in bad air, which
wakens me more surely than any sound. It
may have been an hour or two after 1 woke
to find the room filled with q dreadful odor,
such as might be left by the company of q
corpse nine days old. To throw on the outer
garments, drag open the blind and flee to
| the upper deck forward was the work Of the
shortest possible instant. All outside the
window were bales of freight closely slowed,
leaving hardly glimpse of night or q
crevice for air, and exhaling putrescence into
the stateroom till was drugged, poisoned
| with the fetor.
KEPT AWAKE BY RAGS.
| The first being in blue and gold passing
| I led down to that stateroom and unlocked
| the door in his face. He recoiled at the
stencil. and when I demanded what was in
those bales and he said rags" the matter
took new horrors. It was bad enough to
suppose ones SELF walled in with decaying
rawhides-but ragsl have been in he
haunts of contagious fever, and the odor &C.
companying is never to be forgotten, and
that odor Of putrid vomit filled the lower
rooms and rose from those bales to the upper
cabin as the deck hands began to wheel them
to the wharf.
When we recall the outbreak Of typhoid
| at Cumberland, on the Potomac; the linger-
ing disease at Johnstown since the food
yellow fever at Key West in January of
this year, and the numberless typhoid caseI
in different parts of the country, it is not re
assuring to travel in company with rags oi
that odor. I had gone from the seacoasi
and the best sanitary conditions the morn
ing OF that day. went to pure air and
wholesome surroundings Immediately, yet
two weeks have not undone the work ol
that nights poisoning by deadly air. The
prostration Of strength, the acute miseries
following, with symptoms of blood poison
| ing, are too discouraging to relate. There
is no reason why travel should not be alto
gether q benefit and a pleasure in itself.
FAULTS ON BOTH SIDES.
| The fault lies with travellers as much al
with the transporters. So long as people
will paw for comfort and safety and endure
nearly every i'll that nature can bear in
silence, or confne their protests to the
bosom of their families, where they do no
good, so long the present faulty state oi
things will be permanent as the walls ot
Rhodes. As a specimen of the ignorance OF
health which pervades society take the para
graph in several papers about the trouble
| with rats dying in buildings. A landlord
complains that there is hardly a month
when tenants do not send to him to have a
dead rat removed from the floor or the wall,
and if it isn't attended to they will be COM
pelled to move out, the smell making the
place uninhatitable.
Now, admit" says the landlord, "that
a dead rat is unpleasant, but it does not take
more than six weeks sor it to become entire
" inoffensive through the ordinary process
| Of decomposition. I think tenants might
exercise a little patience rather than compel
me to 90 to the trouble of tearing everything
up, often at considerable cost, all for mis-
erable dead rat"
I Ivonder how many thousand people read
these lines without seeing their point. >Thil
man would have them live in sufocatlon,
with an odor which will 80 pervade house
that he has "known two entire floors of 9
dwelling to be torn ND to find its source, 81
inhaling putrefaction In every breath with
all the danger attending this most virulent
poison, sooner than put him to trouble and
expense.
| A SMELL IS DEADLY.
You can kill q man quicker by an evil
smell than any other way in the world i
YOU know how to 90 about it, and all evil
smells are in greater or less degree poison
Gus, and reduce vitality where they do NO
destroy outright. The London Lancet gave
the case of gentleman in railroad car de-
tanned alongside cars of hogs In an offensive
condition about Is minutes. He was taken
ill with symptoms of prostration, though
previously in health, and died shortly alter,
poisoned by the intolerable odor. Down in
old Quincy, Mass, not 30 very far from
John Adams hay field Of the Revolution,
on a BY road used to be, may be now,
that distress to a neighborhood known as a
| pig farm. II you ever come within two
| miles of such an institution with the wind
YOUR way YOU will remember and flee the
vicinity ever after. think it was Captain
Adams wife living on the straight road
from the farm, hard-working, enduring
New England woman, who began sinkln g
in health soon after the establishment Of the
piggery and died in decline.
She protested over and over that the air
from the pig farm was killing her, and
4 neighbor women believe to this day that
she died of the ef1uvia, which undoubtedly
was the cause OF her death. To quote the
Yankee formula those most concerned
"thought twas only nerves till she up and
died, and then they began to think some
thing was wrong" When the world is q
good deal more intelligent than it is men
and women oil acute sensibilities wilr not be