3
Deaths from Cholera.
January 1867
21
January 1868
20
January 1867PH
31
February 1867
30
March 1867
GO
CO
CO
March 1868
1G9
April 1867.
179
April 1868
171
May 1867.
95
228
June 1867.
65
June 1868.
185
7. The Magistrate of Mirzapore forwarded a copy of a report on the
subject to the Secretary to Government, North Western Provinces, dated 27th
May 1868, of which the following is an extract :—"The only instance where the
cholera was decidedly of an epidemic character was that reported especially to
the Commissioner on the 21st May. when 32 persons, of whom 14 were children,
were stated to have died in one village about 12 miles north of the Sone, in one
week. There have been no instances of the disease fastening on to thickly
populated bazaars, and the towns of Mirzapore and Chuñar are fairly free of it.
As far as I can learn the disease is not more prevalent in this year than in the ave-
rage of years. We had a threatening of a severe season of sickness in the latter end
of February and commencement of March, but in the first week in March we got
a few heavy showers of rain and hail, accompanied by lightning, and that cleared
the atmosphere and drove the disease out of the district for several weeks."
8. It would appear then from these extracts that cholera, though not
considered epidemic, had been present in those districts in the early months of
1868. From Mirzapore or Benares the Nagpore road is daily reached by the
mails in less than two days, but natives travelling would take a day or two
longer.
9. Since the opening of the East Indian Railway to Jubbulpore in 1897
the line of road between that station and the terminus of the branch of the
Great Indian Peninsula Railway at Nagpore, had become a part of the main lino
of postal communication between the Bengal Presidency and Europe. It was
therefore of the utmost importance that the road should be kept in as perfect
repair as possible. Accordingly gangs of coolies had been collected and were
employed in collecting metal for the purpose of remetalling the road throughout
its whole length as soon as the rains should set in. The whole length of the
road between Nagpore and Jubbulpore is 164 miles. At Kamptee, 10 miles from
Nagpore, it crosses the Kanhan river, and near its other extremity, 5 miles from
Jubbulpore, it crosses the Nerbudda ; between these two rivers, the road traverses
a hilly tract of country that forms almost the central portion of the Sautpoora
range. Leaving the Nagpore plain 12 miles north of the Kanhan the road enters
among the lower spurs of the range and traverses a wide tract of jungle, broken
only here and there by small spaces of cultivated ground. At Korai, near the
55th mile from Nagpore, the road commences an abrupt ascent of 500 feet in a
few miles, and soon after reaching the top of the ghat, emerges into the open
plateau in which the station of Seonee is situated. The geological formation of
this section is metamorphic, consisting of granitic and gneissic rocks ; the soil in
the small valleys is a vegetable mould, mixed with a large proportion of sand ; the
streams that cross the road in this section have deep sandy beds, which in the hot
months absorb the water, and there is nothing visible but a dry bed of loose
sand ; but by digging, a little water is reached, and for the most part along