30
towards the river, which is the chief source of water-supply. It here forms a deep
pool, nearly stagnant in the hot weather ; but the little current there is is under
the bank on which the town is placed; the people bathe and draw drinking water
from the same pool. Cholera was twice imported into this place, but it did not
spread. The first instance was that of a man who had been to Seonee ; he was taken
ill immediately on his return, and died on the 1st June. A month afterwards a
Mussulman who had been to Surukha, a village in the neighbourhood, where
cholera was prevalent, returned ill and died ; after this one or two cases occurred,
but they recoced. In 1865 cholera caused great mortality here,—they say that
then upwards of 50 persons died ; and this year 27 deaths occurred at the end
of May.
108. Kohkah,—a village on the Gunga river, two miles from Keolaree; popu-
lation 2'98. 11 persons died from cholera ; the first death was reported on 6th
June. The villagers gave the following account of the out-break :—The body
of the man that returned ill from Seonee, and died at Keolaree, was buried in the
jungle towards Kohkah. It was, however, dug up again by jackals, and was there
seen by an Aheer tending cattle ; he was attacked the same night and died the
next day. The day he died, a Rajpoot woman living in another part of the village
was attacked and died. It then spread over the village ; 7 persons died in the first
two days; afterwards there was an interval of three or four days between each death.
The village is on high rocky ground, about of a mile from the river. The
people drink water from a surface well a little distance from the village ; the sup-
ply was extremely scanty when cholera broke out ; the well was quite unpro-
tected, by coping, from pollution from the surface.
109. From Keolaree, on the border of the Seonee district, the road to
Mundla, after crossing the Wyngunga, traverses for 15 miles a wide tract of
waste and jungle ; it then enters the Heerapore valley, in which there are many
large villages belonging to the Pindraye circle. Cholera prevailed among them
to a great extent. Heerapore, the largest village, escaped. It is situated on trap,
but in the valley below, the blacksoil is of great depth. The sub-soil water is within
a few feet of the surface, and the people draw their water from surface wells sunk
in cultivated ground. At Neewarra, a village not half a mile from Heerapore,
similarly situated, 15 deaths from cholera occurred in May and June out of a
population of 452. The water-supply is derived partly from a well and partly from
a stream. At Gokulthana, less than a mile from Heerapore, on the other side,
15 deaths occurred in August, out of a population of 418. The water-supply here
also is drawn partly from a well and partly from the same stream. The first
person attacked in the village was the wife of the Kotwal of the neighbouring
village of Jeonara, who lived at Gokulthana, but went daily backwards and forwards
to Jeonara. In the latter village, which is close to Gokulthana, cholera had
broke out in July, and 25 persons died out of a population of 286. There is no
well in this village, and the people derived their water solely from the stream.
110. From Heerapore the road again traverses for 10 or 15 miles hill and
dense jungle, opening out here and there into glades of cultivated land occupied
by small villages inhabited by Gonds ; in several, cases of cholera occurred. At
Oomadehi, population 95, three deaths were reported ; water-supply from a spring
At Dhoonda, quite in dense forest, population 146, five deaths ; water-supply
also from a spring. These villages were very dirty,—the villagers keeping a number
of cattle, which they water at the springs. Crossing a range of hills the road
descends into the valley of the Nerbudda opposite Mundla. Several villages in
this part of the valley suffered.
111.
At Nadia, population 153, situated on blacksoil, with a dense tope of
mango trees to the west, 7 cases occurred in July ; water is drawn from a small
stream running into the Bunjur, At Palaygaon, half a mile from Nadia, on