Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1867-10-19


ments Tho story is told below
0FFIoR sEoErrARv BolRp oy HRALTH.(
| MEMPHIS, October IL, 1907
Interments from yellow foyer for the
twenty -four hours ending at . pm,
three. w. L. Rooms, MD,
Secretary Board Of Health
The number Of cases and deaths re-
ported during the past week shows the
absurdity of declaring the yellow fever
Cor whatever tho disease may bel cpl
demic. The first daily report Of deaths
was published Wednesday morning. The
result for four days has been as follows;
For tho twenty four hours ending at five
o'clock Tuesday afternoon, 6; Wednes-
day, IL Thursday, o; Friday, 3-total,
20; an average of per day, or 50 per
week. Should the report closing at FIVE
o'clock this evening be no larger than
yesterdays, the mortality will not reach
that figure. When il is remembered that
Memphis contains $4,000 or $4,000 in
habitants, a very large proportion OF
whom ure unacclimated, the facts given
above require no other comment
They show for themselves The re-
cord of the past three weeks
will doubtless reveal more deaths from
congestion than the disease which some
of the doctors pronounce, and others do
not believe TO be, yellow fever; but
which for few days, TO use a ring
phrase, knocked SO many of them out
OF time" The proceedings Of the ply
sicians' meeting last Sunday could
scarcely have been more ill'advised or
premature. They were extremely
panicky, and induced the public belief
that many of our physicians were fright
ened out of their propriety. A man may
be an excellent physician and an indif-
ferent prophet, as the experience of the
past week has shown; yet he sensa-
tionalisms brought to life in the Gayoso
parlors caused a much more general
hegira of citizens than resulted from the
terrible visitation Of cholera last year.
Now that the mist has cleared away,
even those who act first and think after
ward see the absurdity Of giving credence
to the legion of improbable rumors set
anoat by different parties. The follow
ing Cairo dispatch of the 18th to the
St. Louis Republicaa furnishes pretty
fair illustration of the form assumed by
these sensations abroad
Crowds from Memphis passed up to-
day, fleeing from yellow fever. They
report the greatest panic among the peo'
pie there.
People frightened out of their wits
generally regard everybody else as in the
same condition. In many instances re-
gard for their families induced gentlemen
to remove them beyond the reach of the
disease, but they are not the class who
ventilated the silly sensations woven into
shape on the streets. Those most
alarmed are the class who have gene.
rally so much to say about their own
valor and other peoples timidity. None
of them can be found in Memphis to-day.
They vanquished before dreadful Bronze
John fairly entered and when the fever
subsidies, will return to illustrate how
they, and not those who faced the grim
intruder, were brave. We have always
observed that during the prevalence of
epidemics the first to develop lack
of moral courage are the class who wish
to be regarded as fearing neither God,
man nor devil. 1t is the quiet people,
who never blow their own trumpets, who
generally make the bravest soldiers in
battle and stand firmly when pestilence is
striking right and left among them.
Theirs is the highest type of courage.
It would be we'll enough for those absent
to remain away until the abatement Of
the fever is no longer a matter of doubt,
but there is no reason why others should
now leave. Had Judge Smith, who con-
tracted the disease here, remained where
he could have received the attention Of
physicians experienced in treating it, he
would doubtless have been long spared
to the life of usefulness he led and we
fear that others who, like him, fled be-
yond the reach of proper attention, may
suffer. The progress of the fever here
has shown that few of our own physi-
clans had any practical knowledge of
its peculiarities.