Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1867-03-28
ASIATIO CHOLERA.
A Lesson flom English History.

IN Jue year lOOo, Luc CuUltTh, hltOl
having committed various ravages in
many parts of Europe, visited Scotland
There it was sure to find numerous vic
Tins among a badly fed badly housed
and not over cleanly people. For, il
there is, ore thing better established than
another respecting this disease, it is that
it invariably attacks with the greatest
effect, those classes who, from poverty
and from sloth are imperfectly nourished,
neglect their persons and live in dirty,
ill-drained or illventilated dwellings. In
Scotland such classes are very numerous.
In Scotland, therefore, the cholera must
needs be very fatal. In this there was
nothing mysterious. On the contrary,
the mystery would have been, if an cpl
demic like the Asiatic cholera had spared
a country like Scotland, where all the
materials were collected on which pesti-
lence feeds, and where filth, penury and
disorder abounds on every side Under
these circumstances it must have been
evident, not merely to men OF science,
but to all men of plain. sound under
standing, who would apply their minds
to the matter without prejudice, that the
Scotch had but one way to grapple with
their terrible enemy. 1t became them to
feed their poor, to clense their cesspools
and to ventilate their houses. If they
had done this, and done it quickly,
thousands of lives would have been
spared. But they neglected it, and the
country was thrown into mourning. The
Scotch clergy occupying the old ground
on which the members Of their profess
sion had always been accustomed to
stand, took for granted that the cholera
was the result of Divine anger, and was
intended to chastise our sins Conse-
quently, the presbytery of Edinburgh
applied to the Home Secretary for the
appointment by the Queen of q national
day of fast and humiliation.
In answer, they we're informed that the
affairs of this world were regulated by
natural laws, on the observance of which
the veal and woe of mankind depended.
One of those laws connects disease with
the exhalation of bodies; and it was by
virtue of this law that contagion spread,
either in crowded cities or in places
where vegetable decomposition was going
on. Man by exerting himself could dis
perse or neutralize these noxious infu-
ences The appearance of cholera proved
that he had not exerted himself The
towns had not been purified, hence the
root of the evil. The Home Secretary
therefore advised the presbytery of Edin-
burg, that it was better to cleanse than
fast. He thought that the plague being
upon them, activity was better than hu-
initiation. 1t was now autumn, and be-
fore the hot weather would return, con-
siderable period would elapse. That Pc
rod should be employed in destroying
the causes Of disease by improving the
abodes Of the poor. If this we're done,
all would go well, otherwise pestilence
would be sure to revisit them.
y Lord Palmerston would therefore
sugges. that the best course the
people Of the realm could pursue to de-
serve that the further progress of the
cholera should be stayed, would be to
employ the interval between the present
time and the beg.uning Of next spring in
planning and execcting measures by
which those portions Cf their towns and
cities which were inhabited by their poor
est classes, and which, from the nature
of things, must most need publication
and improvement, might be freed from
those causes and sources Of contagion
which, if allowed to remain, would infal-
libly breed pestilence and be fruitful in
death, in spite Of all the prayers and fast
ings of united but inactive nation.-
Extract of BHrklss CsciizdtiOH in
EnglqHd