Fairhaven herald. [volume] (Fairhaven, Wash.) 1890-????, 1892-04-16
Typhus.

Typhus thus far has appeared as fan
west as st. Louis and northward as fan
as Massachusetts. In New York city
| alone there have been over $50 cases.
/ Eight per cent. Of the victims die Most
| of the patients came from the infected
[ ship Massilia As the negroes captured
in Africa and crowded together on slave
ships gave yellow fever to their white
| captors, so the immigrants from the
Massilia spread the deadly typhus upon
shore
Dr. Cyrus Edison writes an important
paper on typhus in the New York Her
aid 1t is also known as ship fever and
spotted fever. Like almost every other
ailment, it is a microbe disease. No ex-
periments, so far as known, however,
have yet been made in the way Of moe
ulation for 1t. 1t is essentially a disease
of filth, famine and nonventilatIon. 1t
may finally attack the cleanliest and
most wealthy, but it invariably appears
among the dirty, insutficiently nOurished
tenement house people. Thus these out,
casts take their revenge at last on high
society. 1t is the old lesson anew-that
no man can live to himself alone.
In the dark, foul dens where poverty
stricken wretches huddle together and
shut all the windows to keep ont the
cold, typhus most loves to nest. Conse-
quently it is worse in winter The open
ing of the windows in summer drives
the deadly germ away
Most important to us however, and
little reassurng, is DR.. Edsons assertion
that typhus is not the only one of the
terror phantoms which the Russian fam
inc will let loose upon the world The
Russian grip has already devastated Eu-
rope and America, growing more yiru-
lent each season. A Pandoras box of
deadly diseases will be poured upon the
civilized world from this Russian fam
inc. 1t is many a century since fam
inc 50 terrible as the one now raging in
Russia has afflicted the world As in
the old time and always, it is followed
by pestilence. Russia is a menace to
the health of the nations at present.
1t is curious to note how persons of
different race behave under the inhu-
ence of the typhus delirium. We quote
from Dr. Edison
There is one thing which has been noticed
among these patients which is to the last de-
gree strange from the standpoint Of the physi-
clan. / have spoken of the delirium of typhus
and of its intense character. Ordinarily speak
ing this delirum is very active, the patient
especially if he be an lrishman or an Ameri-
CAMS kept in bed with difficulty; he talks
about his business, his troubles, his private af-
fairs increasingly. say if he be Irish, for this
intense activity Of mind when the patient is
dclirious, and of body, too, for that matter is
more noticeable among them than among any
other race. The French come next But the
English. the Germans, Spaniards or Italians
show the same thing and need constant watch
ing, especially to keep them in bed. In the
cases of these Russian Hebrews the observed
effects are all reversed. They are phlegmatic,
dull, stupid, apparently; they talk little if
any, and they lie, for the most part, quietly in
their beds or toss from side to side without at
tempting to get up. When the mind is in that
semiconscious state in which impressions may
be conveyed to it and partly understood, these
Russians obey orders at once without protest.
It is enough for them that any one seeming to
have authority should command.