Spirit of the age. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1849-1865, 1855-09-19
From the National Intelligencer.
Quarantine, Yellow Fever, Public Good

SNS AOAAA SAS A0N NSOOs
There appears to be an una~ccountable de-
sire amongst some medical men to inoculate
the public mind with the idea that yeGov f.
ger is not contagious. I have seen much Of
the disease and observed its characteristics
It is contagious beyond the shadow of a
doubt; and by an efficient quarantine, with
some other minor precautions, in any place
where it is not endemic, it can easily be
prevented from spreading.
To impress my observation upon you more
fully let me state what occurred here and at
points in connexion with us in the yellow fe-
YER summer Of 1858 which | personally
knew of. We had no quarantine then,
Though happily We were preserved from a
similar visitation last year by one, as we are
this Our steamboats, ran up the Alabama
river to Montgomery. At this point end at
Selma, below, they had this fever. though
their locations are healthy and population
small, while at Wetumpka, twelve miles
they ran up to Demopolis, and they had the
fever as violently and proportionably more
fatally than in Mobile.
Now, let US look at its contagiousness.-
Eutaw, some fifteen miles above, on the War
rior river, although two or three times
the population perhaps of Demopolis, had
not a case. Gainesville, some twenty miles
above, three or four times larger, had not a
case. Boats could not reach these points
hence their safety.
But the most remarkable illustration, ex-
hibiting it's contagiousness beyond a doubt,
and by the by, exhibiting your position very
clearly was this:-An old man, with a wife
and some ten or twelve children, living near
our grave yard, was one of the first known
victims to this fever in our city. His death
left his family unprotected, and a friend here
provided for their return to their former
home amongst their relatives and friends in
Clarke county. Going early in the season,
their appearance in the high hills of Clarke
induced no apprehension of danger. In SO
large a family, when some two or three of
the children one after another got sick, that
induced no apprehension, and relatives and
friends rapidly came to the aid and comfort
of the afflicted. From this family the fever
spread in that country place, and for miles
away committed the most fearful havoc in a
sparsely-settled district of high pine woods
country, where the existence of any sort of a
fever before had scarcely ever been heard of.
{ The family referred to carried it with them
in their clothing no doubt.
Further Last year our city adopted quar-
$ antine regulations: New Orleans, Savan-
nah, and Charleston did not. We escaped
the fever, but they had it and suffered awful
; ly by it. In New Orleans they have this
5 year adopted quarantine regulations, yet
they have the fever. Then the question ari-
P ses, is it not endemic there? l fear there
is a cause there which must be fatal to its
citizens unless it can be remedied. 1t is
this the city being below the level of the
river they cannot inter their dead under
ground. They have sepulchres, made Of
brick and mortar, above ground. My i'm
e preston is that the assures in those sepul
e chres, especially of yellow fever subjects, al
low a miasma to exude from them which
contaminates their atmosphere and propa
gate the disease. That there are assures il
them is as likely as that there are in rock
and the earth.
Finally, and in conclusion respecting con
n tagion, | will simply add that one of our dis
tinguished physicians who, it is said, hal
until 1858 argned against contagion, tina
o. summer withdrew his family to his father-in
a. laws, some seven miles out from our city
ID in the pine hills. He now mournfully ad
ID mits its contagion, as out there he 10 st .tou
of his lovely children, a grown brother-in
s, law, and the family a number of negroes
s, and any one who would intimate the diseas
ce to be endemic there would proclaim himse,
a maniac.