Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1893-01-11
THE BLACK DEATH.
Temperance of a Terrible Scourge
in Turkestan.
Some of the Rayages of the Dread Dis
ease-The Frightful Mortality Con-
sequent Upon Its Visits to
Europe.

Europe.
Recent advices from Turkestan tell
of the outbreak there of the black
death in a very virulent form. some
thirteen hundred people dying of the
disease in u small town inside of six
days. The black death, says the New
York Sun, is an unfamiliar name to
modern times, but in the middle ages
it was a current term, never spoken
without sense of horror. 1t passed
under different names at times, such as
the great death, the "bubo plague,
the plague" and, indeed, it was the
j plague of the ancieuts. 1t was the
plague of the time of Traian and was
first mentioned historically by the ply
stefan Rufus, of Ephesus. and for 1000
years it las paid periodical visits, chief
i ly to Mediterranean shores. In the
fourteenth century it extended all over
Europe and the mortality was fright
FIJI, fully 25,00o,00o of people having
succumbed to the scourgc while at the
same time in the cast 2300O, 200 and in
China $4,000, 900 persisted. In 1886 some
800, 900 people were carried off in five
months by the plague in Naples. Lon
don had been visited many times by
the disease, when what is known as
the great plague of London" pre-
vailed in 1864, and about onc-siXth of
the population of the city was carried
off. In Toulon in 1721 one-third of the
population persisted.
Almost the last appearance of the
black death in Europe was in 1910 and
1911, in Turkey and Dalmatia. 1t has
never appeared in the United States.
Our first accurate knowledge of the
scourgc dates from its prevalence in
Egypt from 1893 TO 1913, where it was
studied by European physicians as care
fully as could be done with the restrict
ed pathological teachings of that time.
Since then there have been outbreaks
in lrali on the Euphrates in 1867 and in
1878, in 1S76 at Bagdad. in 1877 at other
points on the Iigris, and again in 1881
in the same parts of Mesopotamia. In
1873 Europe was thrown into n panic by
the appearance of the plague on the
banks of the Nolga, but it was mild in
character and died out spontaneously
in short time The various govern
ments sent commissions to the spot to
study and report upon the disorder, but
it had quite disappeared when the
commissioners arrived, and consequent
lY our scientific knowledge of the disor-
der was not increased.
We know it to be the most fatal of
all epidemic diseases. The mortality
varies from sixty to ninety per cent. OF
those attacked and occasionally every
person affected dies. Not only human
beings suffer, but rats, cats, dogs. cat
tie and other animals become victims
to the pcstilenee. 1t is undoubtedly an
AGATE infectious disease caused by some
micro organism which has unusually
malignant proclivities, and which null
/ tipiies with enormous rapidity within
the body. Death sometimes takes place
| in very few hours. Among the symp-
toms which have contributed to its var-
GUS designations are enlargement and
suppuration of glands and the forma-
! ton of carbuncles, whence the name
"bubo-plaguc: and hemorrhagic spots
and pctechm under the skin, rendering
the body quite dark or black, whence
the origin of the phrase '.blacl1 death"
blht lllt' tHoteTd ana smallpox ana
several other contagious diseases, it
haunts the habitations of the poor. the
shiftlcss, and the squalid. Modern
civilization in Europe with its i'm
/ proved sanitation of cities and perfected
water supply, has gradually eradicated
most of the cpidemics that so ravaged
medieval peoples, but pestilcnco still
fingers among the OrientGls. whero
everything it demands for it's susten-
ancc and pcrpctuation is furnished with
] prodigal libcrality; foul water, decay.
/ ing food, vile habits, filthy houses. un-
clean vcstmcntS, and streets rocking
( with garbage and otfal. 50 long as
those conditions persist, and unhappily
/ they do persist even under the foster.
ing care of European governments
having control in these regions 50 long
will the east be constant menace to
! the health of civilized mankind While
it is hardly probable that the black
death will ever again visit Europe in
form SO calamitous as formerly, still
conditions might at some time become
so favorable for the growth and prop
/ agation of its germ that it might
cause great havoc in certain continental
cities such as Astrakhan, Constan-
tinople, and the like where sanitation
/ is scarcely known even by name
|