Our Drains | AdventAI

Pacific Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Oakland, California · Apr 20, 1876

Our Drains.

Our drains! our drains! our foul, leaking drains! They poison the air of our streets and our lanes, In city and suburb, in hamlet and town, 'Neath dwellings and workshops, wherever laid down. Can reason still fail young and old to convince That sewer-gas slaughters both peasant and prince? How can we have health if the blood in our veins Is poisoned by breathing foul air from the drains?

Our drains! our drains! our badly made drains! That give out their smells ere and after it rains, Sickening the robust man walking the flags, Prostrating the half-nourished worker in rags, Swift-stealing through portals where fashion and rank Sit proudly on cushions, in drives from the bank. But headache and faintness and death-loading pains, Go home in the carriage to tell of the drains.

Our drains! our drains! our death-dealing drains! Choked up, with no outlet for rotten remains, Chronic hotbeds of typhoid, full of foul silt, Reflecting our ignorance, proving our guilt, And showing that we have been riding rough-shod O'er Nature, and morals, and maxims of God. For pure air and water in cities and plains, Spell health, if we keep right our dwellings and drains.

—London Builder.