The St. Johns herald., 1893-11-30
WEALTH FROM REFUSE.
A Singular Industry of the Great
 City of Paris.
Dead Animals Fishe'l from the Rivers and Sewers Treated wisil Chemicals and Converted Into Useful Articles
 Of Commerce.

O1 commerce.
 The following account is given by Charles Gaston, who has for years been connected with the famous firm of Souffrice ct Cie, who have been win ming wealth from the sewers of Paris, says the San Francisco Examiner.
 Mir. Gaston has not come to San Francisco with the idea of suggesting the adoption of the Paris system in connection with the sewers here, but, as ap expert in his line, he has discov- cred in a day that San FranciscO's sys- tem of sewerage is at least several de- grees short of the Parisian ideal
 ''The work done by the Maison Souf- frice in Paris, said Mir. Gaston, could not be carried on So well in San Fran cisco or in Chicago as in New York, or Philadelphia or Washington. It needs a stream, and Paris has the advantage of the Seine, where there is no tide. With the help of the Seine NM. Souf- frice have made an immense fortune, and they have won it all from the waste of great city. All the sewers of Paris,
  sewer which empties into the Seine just below the bridge of Asnieres. All the refuse, the greasy and dirty water, the unclean waste of the shops and streets, pass into this and out upon the river again in one form or another, and it is from this we reap our har- vest"
 AIr. Gaston said the firm had never asked a sou for scavenging the city and found themselves fully repaid by what they collected in the streets and in the waters of the Seine. The founder of the firm, as early as 1886, began the study of how all waste ma terial might be utilized. He afterward associated his sons and then his grand sons with him, and early in the eos they took the job of keeping Paris clean. They built a big factory at Dourget and had the chiffoniers bring there the rags and refuse of the city and they turned it into gold.
 The next step was the development of speciality in the utilization of the waste of the butcher shops and sham bles. This was all boiled in great vats and the scum was made into oil and candles and other merchantable com modities. One set of men collected the rags and waste that engineers and ma chinists used around the factories and machine shops. The grease was ex- trated from these and purified, the rags were sorted, the woolen stuff reduced to powder for fertilization purposes, and the cotton turned into paper stock. Mir. Gaston's personal superintendence, when at Paris. has been directly in con- nection with the collection of things found floating on the water. The firm got permission to construct short piers out into the Seine below the point where the great sewer empties, and on these men stand with huge forks or spoons, lifting out everything that floats along. It is all carted to Bour- get and boiled and squeezed and sorted. The grease is treated with lime, and is transformed into soap and glycerine. The wood, hay, stubble, corks and pa per, when dry, are used to feed the factory furnace.
 ''You would probably be surprised" said Mir. Gaston, ito know how many animals are picked up in the Seine in the course of year. l can give you some figures that will astonish you, but can assure you they are less than the actual records. 1 have known more than eight thousand dogs to be fished out of the Seine in a single year. Calves, sheep, goats and pigs come aloug every day or two. Scarcely a day passes without a goose, or duck, or chicken being found, and rats are very plentiful.
 Next to the dogs, however, come the rabbits. The poor people of Paris all have dogs, and most of them raise rabbits in back yard or on the roof. The latter breed so fast that many of them are thrown into the sewer, and then they are part of the fish that come to the Souffricc net. Cats come under the same category. All these bodies are treated with chemicals, and the different parts are utilized to the best advantage"
 An incidental industry developed in this connection was referred to by Mir Gaston as asticots. The eggs of the myriads of flies that congregate on decayed matter at the Bourget factory produce so many grubs that it was found possible to supply them as bait for the entire fishing contingent of Paris, and it is not unusual for the firm to sell five thousand dollars worth of these grubs during a single fishing season.
 "Those connected with the Souffrice establishment are often told,' said he in conclusion, that the original idea of the great business was suggested by Victor Hugo's remark in Les Mis- erables' that Paris throws into the water every year twenty-five million francs.
 Chinese Bill of Fare.