The official record of the State Board of Health of Massachusetts : together with a phonographic report of the evidence and arguments at the hearing / by George C. Burpee and W.O. Robson.

  • Tyler, John M.
Date:
1874
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The official record of the State Board of Health of Massachusetts : together with a phonographic report of the evidence and arguments at the hearing / by George C. Burpee and W.O. Robson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine, Harvard Medical School.

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    fruit of this mistake, public apprelienaion was awakened, and it has been since engaged in an effort to trace and detect the source of the atmospheric affliction from which the community suffers. As long as the question of the treatment to be applied for the cure of the evil in the river-beds was a matter of controversy, there was much excitement in the community and denunciation of all suspected causes of the grievance. But men, not inflamed by past relations to the contest, — such as former mayors of Cambridge; the present mayors of both Cambridge and Somerville ; nearly every member of the present Board of Aldermen of Cambridge; represent- atives in both Houses of the Legislature; the late city solicitor, Mr. Parker, together with other prominent citizens, — have the good sense to bow to the advice of the Joint Commission, and the equity to wait for its results. There is no present commotion in Cambridge and Somerville over the vexed Miller's Eiver nuisance. There is a very hopeful attention directed toward the progress and results of the methods suggested by this Board, and enforced by the Legis- lature, for the extermination of the nuisance. Public expectation rests confidently in the belief that the filling of the basins, and the providing of the grand sewer, will cure past and lingering evils in the district. So much for a locality. Continuing the contemplation of purely sanitary observations, you find us employed, w^ith constant and liberal efforts, to relieve the reasonable objections of the community; having every wish for, and interest in, its prosperity and comfort. But attention directed toward our particular establishment — quieted by thd fact that if any similar business can exist in any available situation in Massa- chusetts, we ought not to be, at present, disturbed — is led forward to the ever-pressing inquiry, how the reconciliation, through the efforts of scientific men, of these commercial interests and the pub- lic comfort can be solved and accomplished. The contemplation of the removal from Boston to the West of the hog-slaughtering business leads us to consider what such a step would cost this community. The first effect which summons itself to attention, is the immediate promise of a hard winter, with low wages, and a curtailed employment of the laboring class. To them, as to all consumers, it would mean and be an increase, in our local markets, of at least four cents a pound in the price of pork, — the