57
abrupt break in the reports ; the deaths are registered at Patun, 8 miles distant,
on the 16th July 22, and on the 18th 32 deaths were reported, but on the 2lst
the number had dropped to 6. Kymore is situated quite on the river bank,
which here rises 70 or 80 feet above the stream ; the drainage is rapid, and the
bank is much scored by water-courses. The town was very clean in appearance,
hut the bank of the river and the ravines intersecting it were much defiled. The
people are dependent solely on the river for water, for from the nature of the site
there can be no sub-soil water. A well had been sunk in the town 70 feet deep, but
it only holds water when the river is high. The river below the town is a long
still reach, extending along the whole length of the town, and from 3 to 6 feet in
depth ; the people wash clothes, and bathe, and draw water for domestic use from
all parts of this pool indiscriminately. The dyers, who form a considerable
portion of the population, carry on their operations in the lower portion of the
same pool, and this class appears to have suffered in greater proportion than any
others. The greater number, if not all of the bodies of those who died were
thrown into the river a little distance below the town. There was no evidence
of the choleraic influence having been imported from elsewhere; the disease had,
however, broken out in Kohnee a day or two earlier, and it appeared at the same
time in Patun, between which town and Kymore there is constant intercourse.
The mortality was in all probability greatly aggravated by the pollution of the water
by the dead bodies thrown into the river at Donee ; but even without this addi-
tional source of pollution, the state of the water in the pool below the town would
probably have proved sufficient to render the population liable to cholera.
200. In the village of Deoree, on the opposite bank of the river, cholera
appeared on the same date as in Kymore, and 14 deaths occurred, out of a popu-
lation of 250. The inhabitants draw their water from the rapid running into the
pool under Kymore. This village is in constant communication with Kymore,
the Rajah of the latter place having a house there. From Mooria and Manuk-
wara, small villages below Deoree, no cholera was reported till the 14th and
22nd July.
201. Kuttunghee, five miles higher up the river, affords a remarkable con-
trast with Kymore ; it is situated about a mile from, the river, between the
Kymore and Bhanner hills, immediately under the latter ; the Jubbulpore and
Saugor road runs close by it. On a higher level than the town is a tank of \vide
extent, and under the bund of this tank, and on a narrow strip of ground between
it and the hills, the main portion of the town lies. The chief street in the town is
a water-course, dry, excepting during rain ; but in heavy rains the water must
rush down it violently, the drainage from the face of the hills above being
carried partly through the town, and partly into the tank ; the latter would not
receive the surface drainage of the town. The water-supply is derived from
weils, of which there is a large number, the depth of the water from the surface
being from 12 to 20 feet in the hot weather, rising close to the surface in the
rains. The site of this town is no doubt far more unhealthy than that of
Kymore; the population is larger (3,300), and the houses more crowded to-
gether ; the sub-soil water also is at all seasons of the year within a moderate
depth from the surface, while at Kymore it cannot be said to exist at all. In
Kuttunghee 4 cases of cholera occurred in July. The first case was a man of the
Dheemur caste, who had been employed in a field on the Hirun; he came back
ill, and died the next day ; the second was a man who had been to the jungle to
fetch wood ; of the third there were no particulars known ; the 4th was a girl of
the goatherd caste, who had been tending goats on the Saugor road. The
town may therefore be said to have escaped the epidemic entirely, though on the
bank of the river, on both sides of it, all the villages suffered more or less.
202. Below Kymore, on the road to Patun, the villages dependent on the
Hirun for water suffered severely.