Waste Of Cities

Paris throws five miliions a year into the sea - and this without mctaphor. - How, and in what manner ? Day and night. With what object? Without any object With what a thought? - Without thinking of it. For vh:tt re turn? For nothing. By means of what organ ? What ia ita iutcstine ? lts sew:r. Five millions is the most moderate of the approximate figures which the estimates of spei-ial scieucegivo Soienco, after long experiment, knows that the most fertiliaing and tbc ïaost effective of manures is that of man. - Tho Chinese, we must say to our shame, knew it before us. No Chinese peasant, Eekeberg tolla us. ever goes to ihe city without carrying back, at the two endsof his bamboo, two buckets of what we cali filth. Thanks to human fertilizaron, the earth in China is still as young as in the days of Abraham. Chinese wf)eat yields o, hundred and twenty fold. There is no guano comparable iu fertility to the de tritus of a capital A great city is the most powerful of stercoraries. To ein ploy the i:ity to enrich the plain would be a sure succes. If our gold is filth, on th.e other hand our filth is gold. What is done with thia fllth- gold ? It is swnpt into the abyos. We fit out couvoys of sliips, at great úpense, to gather up at the soutk pole he droppings of petrels and penguins, and tho incalculable element of wealth which we have under our b,and we send o the sea. All the human and animal manure which the world loses, reatored to he land instead of beiug thrown into the water, would suffice to nourish the world. These heaps of garbage at the corners )f the stone blocks, these tumbriïs of pire joltingthrough the atreets at night, hese horrid seavengers' carts, these fetid treams of subterraneau slime which the iaveraenc ludes froni you, do you know what all this is? It is the flaweritig meadow, it is the green grass, it is tnaoram atid tliyme aud sage, it ia game, it s cattle, it is' the satisfied low of huge oxen at eveuing, it is perfumed hay, it ia galden corn, it is bread on your table, it s warm blood in your veins, it ia health, t is joy, it is life. Thus wills that mysorious creation which is transformatiou upon earth and transfiguration in heaven. Put that into the great crucible; your abundance shall spring from it. The nurition of tlje plaina makes the nourishment of mea. You have the power to throw away his wealth, and to think me ridiculoua nto the bargain. That will cap the cliK)ar of your ignpraucp. Statistio8 show that Franco, alone, makes liquidation of a hundred miliions every year into the Atlantic from the mouths of' her rivera. Mark this: with that hundred miliions you might pay a qnarter of the expenses of thö Governtnent. The cleveruess of rnan s such that he prefers to throw this hundred miliions into the gutter. It is the very substauce of the people which is cari ied away, here drop by drop, there in floods, jy the wretched voinitiug of our sewers uto the rivera, and the gigantic collection of our rivers into the ocean. Each hiccough of our cloaca costs us a thousand prancs. From this two resulta: the land impovuvished and the water infected, - Hunger nsing from the furrow and disease risiug from the river. It is uotorions, for instance, that at this hour the Thanieg is poisoning