ill yield good crops." Farmer Grey soon gave work to many
hands, he paid good wages too, and was always among his men to see that
each man did his proper work. He put deep down in the ground miles and
miles of drain pipes, it was said.

Hillside was next to the Mill farm. When Mark Page saw the tons and
tons of dung of all sorts, chalk, and guano, which comes from over the
sea, put on the land, he said that Farmer Grey had put more gold on it
than he would ever get out of it. Farmer Grey said, "Bide a bit,
neighbour, and we shall see."

Farmer Grey heard some people one day talk about their good water and
fine air and clean cottages, and yet that fevers came to the place. So
he went into the village, and walked from cottage to cottage: "Look
here, what is this hole for?" he asked one; "I must hold my nose while I
stand near it. Why it's just under the room where some of you sleep!"

"Oh, that's just a hole where we empty slops, and throw in cabbage
stalks and dirt of all sorts," said the good woman; "we take it out
sometimes to spread on the garden."

"Now hear me, dame," said Farmer Grey, "that hole is just a nest sure to
hatch a fever some day; drain it off, fill it up, and dig a new one at
the end of the garden, and take care that none of the drainings run into
your brook."

"Why is this green ditch close under your window, dame?" he asked of
another.

"Why you see, farmer, it is there, it has always been there, and it's so
handy just to empty the slops and such-like dirt," said the dame; "to be
sure it does smell bad sometimes, but that can't be helped."

"Hear me, dame," said Farmer Grey, "I have a notion that God lets bad
smells come out of such muck just to show us that if we breathe them
they will do us harm; the bad air which comes out of the muck mixes with
the air we are always taking into our insides, and that makes us ill.
You had one child die last summer of fever, and one is now ill. Now
just do you get your good man to drain that off when he comes home, and
tell him that he need not come to work till after breakfast to-morrow,
or noon, if he has not done it."

In another cottage a drain full of filth ran right under the floor. A
cesspool was close to a fourth cottage. In several the floors were
clean; but all sorts of filth had dropped through and stayed there, and
when it rained the water ran under the floor. "Just lift up a plank,"
said Farmer Grey; it was done, and he stuck his stic