“That will help,” said Dr. Strong, “though it won’t cure. You can gain some idea, from this matter of the flies, how intricate a social problem health really is. No man sins to himself alone, in hygiene, and no man can thoroughly protect himself against the misdeeds of his neighbor. It’s true that there is such a thing as individual self-defense by a sort of personal fortifying of the body—I’ll take that up some other time—but it’s very limited. You can carry the fight into the enemy’s country and eradicate the evil conditions that threaten all, only by identifying yourself with your environment, and waging war on that basis. Mr. Clyde, do you know anything about the row of wooden tenements in the adjoining alley?” “Saddler’s Shacks? Not much, except that a lot of Italians live there.” “Some live; some die. The whole settlement is a scandal of overcrowding, dirt, and disease. I’ve made out a little local health report of the place, for the year. Of course, it’s incomplete; but it’s significant. Look it over.” Mr. Clyde read aloud as follows:— Diphtheria 11 cases 2 deaths Measles 20 1 Typhoid fever 4 2 Scarlet fever 13 1 Whooping-cough 20 3 Acute intestinal trouble 45 10 Influenza 16 1 Tuberculosis 6 1 Pneumonia 9 4 “What do you think of it?” asked Dr. Strong. “It’s a bad showing.” “It’s a bad showing and a bad property. Why don’t you buy it?” “Who? I? Are you advising me to buy a job-lot of diseases?” queried Mr. Clyde. “Well—as a protective investment. We’d be safe here if those tenements were run differently.” “But we aren’t in touch with them at all. They are around the corner on another block.” “Nevertheless, visitors pass daily between your house and Saddler’s Shacks. One of the young men from there delivers bread, often with his bare and probably filthy hands. Two of the women peddle fruit about the neighborhood. What Saddler’s Shacks get in the way of disease, you may easily get by transmission from them. Further, the sanitary arrangements of the shacks are primitive, not to say prehistoric, and, incidentally, illegal. They are within the area of fly-travel from here, so both the human and the winged disease-bearers have the best possible opportunity to pick up infection in its worst form.” “Ugh!” said Mrs. Sharpless. “I’ll never eat with a fly again as long as I live!” “Wouldn’t it be a simple matter to have the Bureau of Health condemn the property?” asked Mr. Clyde. “It would not.” Dr. Strong spoke with curt emphasis. “Certain features, you said, are illegal.” “But pull is still stronger than law in this city.” “Who owns Saddler’s Shacks?” asked Grandma Sharpless, going with characteristic directness to the point. “Mrs. Carson Searle.” “Why, then, it’s all right,” asserted Mrs. Clyde. “I know Mrs. Searle very well. She’s a leader in church and charitable work. Of course, she doesn’t know about the condition of the property.”