The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1893-08-19
A CHOLERA BREEDING SPOT.
Holy Well of Zemzem No Better Than a
Pool of Poison.

| Holy Well of zemzem No Better Than a
Pool of Poison.
| A London special in the New York
| Sunday World says that geographers and
| chemists, working together, have succeed
| ed in tracking the cholera and similar
plaques to their breeding ground. They
have put the problem of stopping these
| pestilences that march out of the Orient
| squarely before the Western world.
! If the plaques are to be stopped the
4 sacred we'll, Zemzem, must be destroyed
| or purified-and it is practically impossi-
BILE to purify it. To let it remain as it
| is means, year after year, the same dread
| that now fills Europe and America, with
| every few years plague stealthily STAY
| ing it's tens of thousands. To attempt to
| destroy it OF interfere with it in any way
means the stirring to frenzy of the most
fanatical cruelest people on earth.
The first point in this tracking of
cholera to it's lair was made by the
| chemists They analysed the disease
| carefully. and arrived at these conclu-
| sions: .
First-That cholera is a filth disease,
| carried by dirty people to dirty places
and diffused by specifically poisoned
| water
Second--That you may eat cholera and
| drink cholera, but you cannot eaten
Third-That cholera may be considered
| for all practical purposes, as an exclu-
| sively water carried disease, and that 1t
| is carried only by water poisoned by
| human discharges
The next point was to go back along
The Pathways of Cholera
| TO the place where they met-if they
4 did meet. 1t was found that they did
| meet. converging from north, south, east
and west at the Holy City of the Moham-
medan world, Mecca. It was not hard
| to follow their paths once the neighbor-
hood of Mecca was reached.
Year by,,year in the summer months,
the pilgrims throng there from every
direction. They remain there from a
week to three months, raising the popu-
lation of the Holy City from 25, 600 to
| 100, 900, and often to 100000. Each year
the crowded, steaming, m M l.,aSa
unceremoniously over the -unbur1ed
bodies of thousands of other fanatics slain
| now by small pox, again by yellow fever,
again by cholera, or simultaneously at
tackled and slaughtered by score OF less
for1nidably named diseases. Each year
| the horribly filthy city Stays its temper
ary inhabitants by the thousands, and
the lines of march of those who survive
| are like battlefields on which the dead
are yet injured.
Cholera, filth born disease, spri ngs
from no ordinary neglect of hygienic
precautions. Its germs are lncubated IN
| a condemnation OF flthlnesses-ln the
| meeting of disease germs of all degrees
| of yiruIence. Mecca affords such facili-
flies for termination as does no other spot
on the face of the globe. The Indian
| fairs are bad, and the Indian pilgrim
ages are still worse, but none OF them
has Zemzem.
marble rooms of the famous mosque
at Mecca. 1t is surrounded by a marble
wall five feet high It's circular pool is
less than five feet deep and about six
feet in diameter. Its waters, dark al
ways, and just now dIscolored and III
means One of these, Sir Richard Burton,
saws they are salt bitter, much resem-
hing an infusion of teaspoonful of
Epson salts in a large tumbler OF tepid
water"
is
The Well Which Hagar Found,
when Abraham banished her land that
it burst ont under the stroke of the angel
Gabriel's wing. The name is supposed
to be an imitation of the sound of CUR
Cling water. Although it's veneration
is part of the Mohamlnedan religion, it
was vonerated long before Mohammed
preached the new religion. In fact he
cot his start chiefly through his family
the right of dipping water LOT 6he Pr
| grims. In this way he became widely
Known to he most religious elements OF
| the eastern world.
| Whatever the original source OF these
waters, the present source IS tne uralinage
of Mecca. The well does nov coi4 tIa LII,
the depths, but gets its waters tnrou III
fiItration. The water seeps through the
| sn;l Of a CITY that has no sewerage sys-
| Ton, hit throws it's offal into the streets
| q hears with it all sorts OF lmpurltles
| and stands in it's marble basin verltar
BILE cesspool. Subjected 10 ana t,ss,
| its waters have shown at various times
rom six to fifty times as mucn lmpurlty
as the sewage OF Londoh.
Dnr;no the pilgrimages Mecca, always
dirty. becomes overspread In all us ways
with filth. The rains beating down carry
with them all sorts, OF lmpurltles anu
go filtering through successive i've ! layers tnax
Of impurities of former years until they
reach the well Zemzem ~, s,s,,,
Each devotee who makes the paiHi i,a1
Journey to a. Mff fe Of r Hs edt, OF OF pilgrim
must visit the well Zemzem, ana 90
certain things there ne ssa ai ea az Ina
except q ' breech cloth. The attendant
dips bucket into the pool and nd brings 1t
up full of this awful water: ne oexoo th
wide Omen and the attendant pours the
water Upon his his face He drinks as much
as he can. The rest of the water flows