Читать книгу Aromatics and the Soul: A Study of Smells онлайн

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I may therefore, with justice, raise a song of praise to our fathers who have had our country thus swept and garnished, swept of noxious vapours and emanations, and garnished with the perfume of pure and fresh air, to the delight and invigoration of our souls.

And yet the change has only recently been brought about. Up to the beginning of the nineteenth century the city of London

“was certainly as foul as could be. The streets were unpaved or paved only with rough cobble stones. There were no side walks. The houses projected over the roadway, and were unprovided with rain-water gutters, and during a shower rain fell from the roofs into the middle of the street. These streets were filthy from constant contributions of slops and ordure from animals and human beings. There were no underground drains, and the soil of the town was soaked with the filth of centuries. This sodden condition of the soil must have affected the wells to a greater or less extent.” (“London, Sanitary and Medical,” by G. V. Poore. 1889.)