Weekly Chillicothe crisis. (Chillicothe, Livingston Co., Mo.) 1878-19??, 1880-04-15
THE FAMINE IN BRAZIL.
Awful Suffering and Startling Mortality

Awful Suffering and Startling Mortality
Secretary Evarts has received lette
from the United States consul al Pernam
buco describing the famine in his consul
ate in which the latter says: As the prov
ince of Ceara is within the limits Of IN,
consulate, it is proper that | shoul' sont
to the department Of .ti'c IN ucrount o
the great Secca or drought Of northeli
Brazil, winch extended along the Serta
| 1.-THE term ScrLao simply means the inferi0
of a country as opposed TO the coast; III,
inhabitants Of the Sertao are called Ser
tanejos), or interior, from the headwater
of the Rio Medeirio to the Sierra Araripe
which separates the province of Gear
from Pernambuco.
Two noted seccas prevailed during thu
years 1925 and 1915, but doubt whethe
there has ever been here, or elsewhere, il
the history Of the world famine so fata
in effects in proportion to the population
as this Of Ceara. Those Of India ant
China, it must be considered, occurring
in crowded countries, where the people
are counted by millions, and not by thous
ands like the Cearenses. Two years anc
a half ago, when the secca commenced
the province of Ceara numbered 900,00l
inhabitants; out of these 100000 havt
died Of disease and starvation.
The secca began in the summer of 1876
and has continued to the close Of the yea
1873, lasting for thirty months; no rair
having fallen during the whole two year,
and half, and the once fertile and uxu
RANT Sertao, where the farms and villages
prospCred in peace and plenty now pre-
sents the appearance Of vast blackened
desert, burnt over by fire.
In November Of 1876, after the "Easti'
yete" or summersleep, when the "Chuvas
de CajuS," or fruit rains, failed to appear,
the people did not worry, as their acueles,
or ponds, were not vet exhausted, and
they looked confidently forward to the
winter rains to set everything right. But
these never came, and, as the dry spring
advanced, sad accounts began to come
coastward Of poverty and suffering among
the poor. Later on, as the burning sum.
mer slowly passed, bringing no November
showers, and another January went by
without rain, there came appalling news
OF famine, disease, dead cattle, and Of dy-
ing and despairing people.
Long penltential professions were form
ed and the miserable Sertanejos beat, cut,
and otherwise punished themselves to ap-
pease an offended deity. But the pitiess
secca still continued, threatening every
thing ard everybody with inevitable de-
struction.
The wretched people were now reduced
to the necessity of eating roots, cotton
pods, the Mucuma bean, which produces
dropsy, lizards, dogs, cats, rats, reaches;
any living or dead thing capable of afford.
ing sustenance; and in some instances
they were even goaded to cannibalism by
the pangs of hunger.
To increase the unlmaginable horrors of
the situation, the smallpox broke out
among the Sertanejos and became cpl
demic; typhus and other ievers were rag
ing, and, in February and March of 1873,
the mortality became frightiul.
The cattle were now all dead, the rivers
dried up, and there being no railroads or
communication by which provision could
reach the Sertao, the inhabitants, ,dreading
wholesale starvation, abandoned it alto
gether and the whole torrent of life swept
seaward.
Ceara, Parahyba, Aracaty, Baturite,-
all the towns along the coast were now
alive with suffering humanity; age, youth,
men, women and children, all famine
stricken, coming in from the country by
thousands upon thousands.
The city OF Ceara, with $1,000 inhabit-
ants of its own, received over 10000 Ser
tanejos. Impossible to provide for such a
host the CeareDses did their best, but it
was sorrowful spectacle to see thousands
Of cmaCiated creatures sitting or lying in
the open largos (souares) smitten with
smallpox and other loathsome diseases,
some lamenting their own fate, or the loss
Of friends, others too weak or ill to COM
plain; some wishing to die from despair,
and others insane from suffering; a dam
gerOus and most narrowing scene, one
with few parallels In history.
In Ceara, or Fortaleza, as it is indis-
criminately called, the highest mortality
in normal times was 900 per year. Now
about half the population (25, ,000) is dead.
In the beginning Of last November the
population, including the influx, mum.
bered 10000. The greatest mortality
prevailed in the months of November and
December Of 1878. From the lst OF No.
vember to the 9th Of December there died
of small pox alone, and were buried in the
Lagoa Funda deep lakes) cemetery, for
the poor only, 23,470; estimated from the
9th to 3lst December, 1000; in the st.
Joao Baptiste cemetery, 1892; in the city
cemetery, 1000; estimated buried outside
in fields, ETC., 1000; add to this the NOR
tality from other diseases, 10 per cent,
2,970; total interments for two months,
81 ,57l.
| have given the statistics as figures tell
their own incontrovertible tale. Sixty
tbo Joooo Eun1o oon,oto,.y ,,,h;oh mo,