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Show . prevented. The social loss from fires represents a direct reduction of the national wealth. It adds to the cost of living and reduces the capacity for production. One mill burned down means not only the loss of the mi!!, but also the loss of all the froods it might have manufactured had it not burned. No one escapes the penalty imposed by criminal carelessness. CARELESS FIRES A CRIME. Some cities in this country have taken the advanced ground of adopting adopt-ing ordinances fixing criminal responsibility re-sponsibility upon persons who carelessly care-lessly cause fires. The careless fire is just as much of social crime as a neglect of sanitation. It visits its loss upon the just' and the injust. The fire hazard in America is many times greater than it should be. and much greater than that in any European Euro-pean country. This is due largely to. the carelessness of the people with respect to prevention. A majority of forest fires are started by people who leave live embers behind them to be fanned into blaze by the wind. The accumulation of rubbish in the cities, and the careless use of matches and cigarettes, account for a great num-her num-her of city fires. A law which would make a man both civilly and criminally criminal-ly liable for the starting of a careless fire would probably work wonders in reducing the needless loss. It is not alone for the sake of a saving in rates that fires should be |