44                      HISTORY OF CLAY COUNTY

on Splunge Creek reservoir, in to-day’s paper. Those who read it will
be more than ever convinced that money is a powerful weapon with
which to overcome difficulties.”
    The report was severely criticised through the columns of the press
by citizens in different parts of the county, and the committee charged
with having evaded a candid investigation of the subject.
    The following is the report of the committee as to Birch Creek
reservoir:
    “This feeder was constructed in 1853 at a cost of $30,000, is in the
central part of the county, and covers an area of 1,000 acres. The soil
is argillaceous and but little fitted for the escape of water by percolation.
The surface is flat, covered with a layer of vegetable matter in a state
of decay. The surface is subject to overflow from ‘the creek and from
any considerable rain. Numerous inundations, partially filled with stag-
nant water, strongly impregnated with vegetable matter in a most
offensive condition, are spread out all over the entire territory. The
timber is heavy, and composed of almost every variety of forest trees,
undergrown with brush and grass, many places so thick that it is with
difficulty penetrated. The heavy growth of the timber does, to a certain
extent, prevent both generation and spread of malaria. The whole
presents to the view a most ghastly appearance, having in its very midst
the elements of disease most common to our country. Will the sub-
merging of these grounds exert a deleterious influence upon the hygiene
of the surrounding country? If submerged in the midsummer, when the
foliage is upon the ground, there would be exerted for a time a pernicious
influence; but if submerged in the latter part of the fall or in the winter,
no direct evil influence would be generated.
    “What effect would follow from the complete removal of the
timber? If the timber be cut away and the direct rays of the sun let in
upon its surface in its present condition, an infinitely worse state of
things would follow than from the submerging of the same grounds
under the most unfavorable circumstances. By this process we expose
vegetable matter, stagnated pools of water impregnated with vegetable
matter and alluvial deposit, all the most favorable circumstances for the
generation of malarious poison. Aside from that, the destruction of the
timber will give free circulation to the atmosphere, and malaria, rapidly
generated in this way, would spread with greater facility, and disease
would be the impending result. In all cases where heat and moisture
are present in their proper proportions, the effect will be comparative
to the relative state of decay. The more readily the substances enter
decomposition, the greater will be the amount of deleterious agencies
given off at a given time. Of all conditions favoring the rapid generation
of a poisonous agent from decomposition, water impregnated with such
vegetable products as most decompose is the most favorable for the
rapid generation of miasma, especially where these pools are shallow
and stagnant, and motion and air are precluded. In reference to the
standing timber, it can have, in the opinion of this committee, no bad
effect upon the health of the surrounding country.
    “From inquiry we learn that the greatest complaint against Splunge
Creek reservoir comes from regions which decidedly are and ever have
been pestilential and filled with malarious diseases, at a distance of from
two to five miles from the reservoir, which has claimed to be the great
source of difficulty. There is between those persons and this body of