The Aberdeen weekly. [volume] (Aberdeen, Miss.) 1878-1933, 1909-04-30
The Dirty House Fly.

HOW 0OGi1 the BUSY 1iLllc uA
Improve each shining minute
And where he finds an apple pie
Plant micro-millions in it.
1t wasn't DIR. Watts who wrote
that one; it was DR.. Koch, or one
of his disciples. But it's the whim
of the new medical faith, all right.
As a produc. =. Mr.. Housetly has
Br'er Bee beaten four city blocks.
He loves filth as a Yankee loves a
post office appointment He wal
lows in it, lie glories in it. He
plasters it over his anatomy and
fills up his alimentary canal with
it-and then he finds himself ready
for business. BIZ z-z-z-z-nessl
Zip!
He dabs his reeking corporosity
into the middle of batch Of dough,
and the profane cook eases him over
the edge of the pan with a spoon.
She doesn't kill him. Cooks seem
to have an innate reluctance against
sacrificing the life of the househy.
So he crawls off among the cooking
utensils, leaving trail Of microbes by
the way, and proceeds to rub the
dough from his ugly legs and scrape
1t off his wings. Dough makes an
excellent culture medium He ism t
losing any time Tomorrow there
will be a thousand microbes for ev-
cry one he sheds into the sticky
mass. You can almost hear that
houseHy chuckle as he makes him
self ready for another dash.
This time he alights on the edge
Of cup Of milk. A dainty, pink
and-white child is slipping that
milk. Like all other filthy creatures,
Mr. Housefiy dotcs on daintiness-
as a prey He gloats over the chance
to infect that milk with typhoid
bacili. He knows enough to refrain
from OVERRIDING the thing, too so
be doesn't fall in and cause the
nurse to throw that milk aside and
provide a fresh glass. He stands
upon the rim of the glass, balancing
himself upon four legs, and rubs
the microbes off his dirty body with
the other two. Cute. A Chicago
lawyer couldn't hold a candle to
him
Then he takes a flight across the
lot, calling at a garbage heap on the
way and replenishing his stock Of
microbes, and sails in through the
butchers window. There a nice
quarter of beef-not too fresh, just |
right for his purpose. He alights |
carefully at the lower southwest |
of section ), range 4 west, and |
surveys a line that was never run |
on sea or land, zigzag, Katy
nered, criss- cross, up the center
and all hands round, hop-skip-
and-jump, go as you please, plant
ing bacilli to the right of him,
microbes to the left of him, germs
behind him in volleys and hun
dreds He's doing a land-offlce
business now. Whoopeel If
somebody dosent get typhoid or
some other filth bred disease from
this job-he'll miss his guess.
He dotes on candy stands. He'd
be tempted any day to leave a
break in the sewer to crawl over
candy. And ice-cream He gets
right up out of the stable refuse and
hurtles off hungrily at the mere
mention of it. It's so nice and clean
before he gets to it, After that
we'll. if he really gets there. > that Is
story, possibly blackbor-
dered one.
Filthy If you really grasped the
extent of his nauseating filthiness,
it wouldn't be necessary to say
word about his dangerousness as a
purveyor of disease. The gorge of
the housewife would so rise against
his presence that he would be toler-
ated i'm the household no more than
a viper would be tolerated. Let it
be understood once for all: The
housefly is filthy beyond the utter
most reaches of the Imagination
you see him, hear him,
think. of him. cry Uncleanl I'm
clean
The medical profession has de-
elared war upon him-war of ex
1t should be taken up
oy every householder. There are
Just two phases of it.
The first of these pertains to his |
exclusion from the house, and par
.icularly from where food is kept.
For this purpose screens are very j
Effective where they are kept shut /
against him. And when he makes
lis way withindoors in spite of them
ret fans, brooms. papers, anything /
7ou please, and deive him forth as
,ou would drive a pestilence.
The second phase deals with his