Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1904-05-20
Women as Disease Distributors.

If the average woman were told that
she habitually carried disease to her
loved ones she would doubtless enter |
an indignant protest. Yet the skirts
that she wears at the dictates of fash
ion are such veritable street sweepers
that countless numbers of disease
germs are gathered into the fold and
carried into her home there to seek
whom they may devour The Chicago
Journal grows truly eloquent on the
subject and delivers a discourse on
hygiene that every woman should
read. 1t says:
The woman with the train to her dress
goes downtown, dragging the pestilence
making contriVance behind her. OF course
she holds it up sometimes. but often it
trails along in the dirt, gathering millions
of microbes of unnumbered breeds.
When she gets home again this woman
who conforms to the prevailing fashions
hangs her dress in closet The closet no
doubt Is dark The rays of the sun never
penetrate II. tuberculosis microbes and
most other disease germs love the dark
ness. They like to get away from the
fresh air. They gloat and flourish in this
womans dark closet.
After time some member of the wom-
ans family falls i'll. The dread consump
ton attacks the fairest one of the lot
perhaps, or little child is taken off with
scarlet fever or whooping cough.
Then this grief stricken woman wonders
| where the disease came from.
Here is chance for man to get back
for the whitening remarks made about
him in the womans clubs. He can say
to the collective femininity of the
land, Pause in your devastating ca
reer. There are various other things
that he could say, and doubtless will
say, that need not be repeated here.
The gentler sex has not a monopoly on
garrulity, and If the masculine end of
humanity cannot get rid of his burning
thoughts In any other way he can fly
to the. newspaper. But against the
habit of distributing the festive mi
crobe he can speak with justice. On
this subject his remarks cannot be too
severe.
While we are organizing campaigns
for health the long skirt on the street
should not be neglected 1t is one of
the fashionable relics of barbarism that
must co. 1t is not without some timid-
ity that we recommend the subject to
the various womans> clubs.
That the good work is already start
ed, not in woman's clubs, but by the
ruthless male officials of faroff Bo
hemia, is, shown by this extract from
the Pittsburg Dispatch:
That bold contrast which Dr. Syntax
declared was the first, the middle and the
last of the picturesque is exhibited al
Prague, in Bohemia, where the town
council has placarded notices forbiddina
women wearing skirts that drag on the
streets or in the parks In the kingdom
which gave its name to the unconven-
tional, whose devotees the world over for
years have gloried in dressing as they
pleased and doing things out of the rut
sanitation ruthlessly enters, and women
are first touched In the matter of theil
attire No wonder their Indignation is
highly stirred! 1t has been sung by the
poet that an army of phantoms, pale and
wan, once beleaguered the walls OF
Prague Here is a chance for another
SIEGE
When Bohemia moves it is time fol
America to get busy. AS was said Of
transportation some years ago, "Tht
street train must be elevated"