utside the walls of poisoning their
wells; or how, in some of the pestilences of the middle ages, the common
people used to accuse the poor harmless Jews of poisoning the wells, and
set upon them and murdered them horribly. They were right, I do not
doubt, in their notion that the well-water was giving them the
pestilence: but they had not sense to see that they were poisoning the
wells themselves by their dirt and carelessness; or, in the case of poor
besieged Athens, probably by mere overcrowding, which has cost many a
life ere now, and will cost more. And I am sorry to tell you, my little
man, that even now too many people have no more sense than they had, and
die in consequence. If you could see a battle-field, and men shot down,
writhing and dying in hundreds by shell and bullet, would not that seem
to you a horrid sight? Then--I do not wish to make you sad too early,
but this is a fact which everyone should know--that more people, and not
strong men only, but women and little children too, are killed and
wounded in Great Britain every year by bad water and want of water
together, than were killed and wounded in any battle which has been
fought since you were born. Medical men know this well. And when you
are older, you may see it for yourself in the Registrar-General's
reports, blue-books, pamphlets, and so on, without end.

But why do not people stop such a horrible loss of life?

Well, my dear boy, the true causes of it have only been known for the
last thirty or forty years; and we English are, as good King Alfred found
us to his sorrow a thousand years ago, very slow to move, even when we
see a thing ought to be done. Let us hope that in this matter--we have
been so in most matters as yet--we shall be like the tortoise in the
fable, and not the hare; and by moving slowly, but surely, win the race
at last. But now think for yourself: and see what you would do to save
these people from being poisoned by bad water. Remember that the plain
question is this--The rainwater comes down from heaven as water, and
nothing but water. Rainwater is the only pure water, after all. How
would you save that for the poor people who have none? There; run away
and hunt rabbits on the moor: but look, meanwhile, how you would save
some of this beautiful and precious water which is roaring away into the
sea.

* * * * *

Well? What would you do? Make ponds, you say, like the old monks'
ponds, now all broken down. Da