Alexandria Advertiser And Commercial Intelligencer

Alexandria Advertiser. Wednesday, July 13.

Mr. Snowden,

I observed in your useful paper of the 2d inst. an extract from my letter upon the subject of Yellow Fever, which appeared in Messrs Pechin and Frailey's, of Baltimore, on the 18th of May last. Several parts are erroneously transcribed, yet I believe it is correct enough to convey my ideas. The letter was written last fall after I had been to Philadelphia and Baltimore, and where I was an eye witness to the havoc of the dreadful disorder. I took some pains to examine into the state of the streets, alleys, and docks, and I could find nothing in either capable of producing such a malady; but so extremely offensive were the necessaries that I could not refrain from puking in many places without keeping a handkerchief to my nose! With these facts, ascertained by the evidence of my own senses, I wrote that opinion; and the more I reflect upon it the more satisfied I feel that all the miseries of yellow fever, in our populous towns, flow from these sources.

I did not presume, in my letter, to suggest the means to obviate it, because if the doctrine would inspire a confidence, it must strike every man that the only effectual method would be to fill up all the wells of necessaries and to appropriate boxes which could be emptied occasionally, by Scavengers, as is done in all the large towns to the south of Europe; and surely any derangement which such a regulation might occasion could not weigh a straw, compared with the effect even of making the town sweet & pleasant, to say nothing about it as a means of preventing the fever.

I observe in the public prints, however, that in both Philadelphia, and Baltimore the idea has been embraced, to a certain extent, and I really must beg to be excused for expressing my astonishment at the feeble essay. Can it be imagined that two pecks of lime will neutralize the effluvia from fifty to one hundred cubic feet of putrid feces? Is it possible that the amiable and learned board of health, with all their experience, can meet this national calamity, or can hazard the lives of thousands, and the prosperity of commercial cities, upon a chemical experiment of this kind, when the evil too may be completely cut up by the roots at a trifling expense!

There seems to have been a strange and unaccountable fatality hanging round the subject of yellow fever, from its first appearance, in 1793, to the present time. There has been a want of union among medical gentlemen--a want of united exertion in their researches--a dread of responsibility, and a temporizing indecision, which has unjustly stigmatized our country "a source of contagion," and stamped an approbrium on the science of medicine. The contrariety of opinions as to the cause, as well as the treatment of the disease, has left the public mind suspended in doubt and perplexity; and, I am sorry to believe, sacrificed thousands of our people to professional frailty.

The Philadelphians, with the embellishments of architecture and a refinement in hydraulics, have introduced water into their city as a preventive--But, alas! it has no effect: because the source of putridity is in their necessaries where the water never goes; and I believe if they made the Schuylkill ripple over every stone, in every street and alley in their city, while the weather is hot and there remains such sources of human feces, their people must die with yellow fever. I will admit that the same heat which evaporates the miasmata, will also carry up the moisture on the irrigated pavement and render the effluvia less active, but it cannot take away the cause of the disease.

Alexandria has arrived to a rank and importance in the commercial world which must soon invite a considerable population. I do sincerely hope her municipality will benefit from the errors of Philadelphia and Baltimore, and avail themselves of the experience of older countries, so that they may be able to perpetuate the salubrity for which she is so eminently distinguished.

Wm. BAKER.