Clothing.
Duty, &c.
Exercise, &c.
Marches and
service.
Hospital.
Sickness,
mortality and
invaliding.
118
MEDICAL AND SANITARY REPORT OF THE NATIVE ARMY OF BENGAL.
X. Clothing.—Has been detailed in previous reports. The ammunition boot is still
worn. A good many cases of blisters of the feet occurred during the year: still if it fits well,
it is the most serviceable that can be worn by the soldiers. The undress clothing is sufficient.
XI. Duty and employment.—The duty is not severe, and bears a very favorable contrast
to what it was in Peshawar. Nights in bed 4 in 7.
XII. Exercise, &c.—A little gardening, wrestling and the native games.
XIII. Marches and service. —The head-quarters, numbering about 500 strong, was en-
camped during the Imperial Assemblage about 3½ miles from Delhi, on the Alipore road,
on an elevated piece of ground, well drained. The drinking water was obtained from a well
about 200 yards from the camp, and was not of good quality, as evidenced by some cases
of dysentery and diarrhœa which occurred; and nearly every case of fever was complicated with
diarrhœa. As only a few of the cases occurred in 1876, they being most prevalent this year
during the last few days of the camp, it is unnecessary to refer to it more particularly in this
report. The feature to be noticed in most of the camping-grounds on the march to Delhi is,
that they are so level and imperfectly drained that lodgments of water must occur after
heavy rain.
XIV. Hospital. —The hospital is constructed on the usual plan. Two wards, a closed
verandah communicating with the centre wards by arched passages, closed by purdahs, bathing-
room, godown, dispensary and prescribing room; has a sloping thatched roof; ventilated by
four apertures in the ridge; can accommodate 60 patients, giving each a cubic capacity of
102.6 feet and a superficial area of 50 feet. In the cold weather the hospital is bleak and
uncomfortable; no means of controlling the ventilation in the roof: the consequence is, that
draughts blow through the building, rendering the purdahs useless. The regulation quantity
of firewood is allowed, but it does not warm the building sufficiently. It is well lighted: the
bedding is sufficient. The new quarters for hospital assistants have been occupied during
the year; but in their present state are most uncomfortable; for a married hospital assistant
has no privacy, no compound, cooking-place or latrine.
XV. Sickness, mortality and invaliding. —Strength of the regiment—
Present
62.6
Absent
68.5
Total
694.5
Principal
causes of
sickness.
STATION.
P E R I O D .
Strength.
TOTAL NUMBER
OF
Daily
average
number of sick.
PER CENT. OF STRENGTH
PER ANNUM.
From
To
A d m i s - s i o n s . Deaths.
Admi s-si ons. Deaths. Daily
average sick.
Head-quarters at Jullundur
and Imperial Camp at Delhi 1st Jan. 1876 31st Dec. 1876 492 1,460 4
31.9 296.74 .81 6.48
Detachment at Ludhiana
16th Ditto 16th Nov. 1876 107
119
4.5 137.28
4.20
" at Phillour
Ditto
Ditto
38
52 1
1.2 167.50 3.22 3.16
Depôt at Jullundur 20th Nov. 1876 31st Dec. 1876 121
31 2
19. 223.26 14.38 15.72
TOTAL
626 1,662 7
39.2 265.49 1.11 6.27
Number of deaths in hospital 7; out of hospital 5; total 12; per cent. of total strength
1.72
" invalided 42; " "
6.05
" sent on sick leave 22; " "
3.17
" of days spent in hospital 14,365; per admission 8.6; per man of total strength
20.68
"
on sick leave 3,300; per man 150; " "
4.75
Total temporary loss of service per man of total strength
25.43
XVI . P r i n c i p a l c a u s e s o f s i c k n e s s —
Admissions.
Malarious fevers
1,172
Bowel-complaints
107
Blisters of feet
97
Chest diseases
54
B o i l s
40
Rheumatism
28
Eye diseases
2 1
Venereal disease
9
The remainder are ordinary cases met with in every regimental hospital. Malarious
fever, though the admissions were greater than they had been in Peshawar for any one of the
three years the regiment was stationed there, was nevertheless of a very mild type. It did
not debilitate the system, or produce the cachectic condition and enlarged spleen, noticeable as
sequences of the disease in Peshawar. The march to Delhi helped in a great measure to
eradicate the poison, and the regiment improved in health and physique every day. The
number of cases of bowel-complaint were greater than the previous year. Blisters of the
feet yielded a good many admissions. Still when it is considered that the regiment marched
twice during the year, and it was a good deal debilitated by sickness, the number is not