Page:A happy half-century and other essays.djvu/124

 108 little grace, on all the disadvantages of the tropics.

The truthfulness and sobriety of this last line deserve commendation. Cockroaches in the open are displeasing to sensitive souls; and a footnote, half a page long, tells us everything we could possibly desire—or fear—to know about these insects. As an example of Dr. Grainger's thoroughness in the treatment of such themes, I quote with delight his approved method of poisoning alligators.

Then follow some very sensible remarks about the unwholesomeness of the water in which the dead alligators are decomposing,—remarks