The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1876-06-17

inmates. On the seventh second attack
occurred. This was followed in rapid sue
cession by other seizures, and within the
space of one month, ninety nine inmates
of the establishment had persisted by chol
era. Within the building and grounds the
most diligent search failed to discover any
thing that could account for this outbreak;
but on examining the premises outside the
northern wall, there was found vast mass
of filth, consisting of the overflowings of
cesspools, the drainage of pig. sites. and
the general refuse of the establishment.
I" In short, says the medical officer, the
whole space included between the ravine
and the wall, upon its north side, was one
putrid and pestilential mass, capable of
generating, under the ardent rays of a mid
summer sun, the most poisonous and deadly
exhalations. x Men,
after some difficulty and delay, were en-
ployed to remove the filth and drain the
ravine, the whole surface of which, after
having been thoroughly cleased by stream
of water, was thickly covered with lime,
over which was put a deep stratum of
earth. The men employed in this work
were attacked with cholera, as were some
of the several inmates of the alm-house
who had been dispersed throughout Balti
more, but the disease did not spread to any
other persons in the city. From the 18th
of July, the disease suddenly declined from
II the day previous to 3, and, by the 9th of
August, had entirely Disappeared
Cholera is born of filth, and spreads only
in it's presence. Every case in our land is
the result of excremental pollution of air
or water and the intensity of its outbreaks
measure the degree of existing foulness Of
town. 1t is clearly within the capabili-
ties of State medicine to ward off it's at
tack, or to expel it.
YELLOW tecer, although differing in it's
epidemic history from cholera, particularly
in the fact that it requires persistent high
temperature for its evolution and sustenta-
ton, yet claims the same putrescent par
entage. Its outbreaks are arrested by SAN
itary forethought, and suppressed by the
abatement of nuisance arising from ami
NAL and vegetable decomposition; facts
we'll known to our South Atlantic and gulf
cities, and long since recognized by the
father of American medicine, Benjamin
Rush, who declared that, 81 look for the
time when our Courts of law shall punish
cities and villages for permitting any of the
sources of bilious and malignant fevers to
exist within their jurisdiction"
The poison of typAus still turks in the
crowded tenements of cities, but John
Towards heroic contest with it, under the
form of Jail distemper, has made popular
the fact that it is dependent upon over
crowding and i'll ventilation.
These pestilcnces prevail, generally, only
at long intervals, and under the stimulus
of peculiar epidemic influence. When
they occur, panic is widespread; business
is abandoned; the inhabitants of stricken
town fly to the country to escape the
scourge; and at last, after incalculable
harm has been done, submit to any sacri-
flee of money to expel it. These diseases
have been selected to point the lesson of
prevention by authority, because the proofs
are more demonstrate than in other cases
of avoidable disease. But there is another
class of preventable diseases, owing their
parentage to filth, which are ever present,
and yearly make such assessments upon
life that the aggregate dwindles into insig-
niticance the loss we have sustained from
all epidemics combined, of small pox, chOl-
era, yellow fever and typhus. And it is
with these diseases, that, as sanitarians,
we are especially concerned; first, because
they comprise so large proportion of the
unnecessary deaths; and. secondly, because
the filthy conditions on which they depend
for their diffusion are in general readily
recognized and easily removable. Typhoid
tecer and the diarrhgas are the representa-
tives of the class alluded to. These dis
eases destroy annually, in the State of
Maryland, over two thousand lives.
Whatever may he the actual materies
nsor6i of typhoid tecer, it has its home in
human excrement, and every case is but
the result of eating, drinking, or breath
ing mans focal matter. John Simon thus
puts it: Adverting, then, summarily, in an
administrative point of view, to the pres
ent state of medical knowledge and opin-
ion as to the way in which enteric or ty-
phod fever spreads its infection, | would
say, it is difficult to conceive, i'll regard to
any causation of disease in civilized COM
munity, any physical picture more loath-
some than that which is here suggested;
that, apparently, of all the diseases that
are attributable to filth, this, as an admin
istrative scandal, may be proclaimed as the
very type and quintessence; that, though
sometimes by covert processes, yet far
oftener in the most glaring way, it appar-
emily has an invariable source in that
which of filth is the filthiest; that, appar-
emily, its infection runs its course, as with