The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1898-10-29
DuCheSSe Anne
an Infected
Ship.
HER CREW REDUCED BY TWO
THE BUBONIC PLAGUE SMoTE
THEM ON THE HIGH SEAS.
Ship Placed in Quarantine-History
of the Dread Disease Now Ter
rorizing All of Southern
Europe.

Last evening, when the French bark
Duchesse Anne, hailing from Hong
kong, passed in through the Golden
Gate she halted in the stream but
a few minutes, then turned her
prov toward Angel Island and went
into quarantine at the Government sta
ton 1t will be weeks before her crew
or cargo will be allowed to land, for
the ship is unclean; from her decks not
long over month ago two bodies were
cast into the sea-two bodies blackened
and distorted by the ravages of the
bubonic plague, "the black death"
A note handed by the ships captain
to the health officer told in simple Ian
guage how 1.-The black death had Wis
tied his vessel and reduced her crew
by two when far from aid out on the
high seas. 1t read:
august 20 CAPTAIN JOS GER
VANY, aged 81 years, a native Of
France, died of bubonic plague and was
buried at sea.
September 10 ANGIE MENIER,
aged so years, a native of France, died
of the same disease and was buried at
sea"
This was the simple story, but 1t car
ried with it terror to the heart of the
health officer. If the dread disease
stretched out and with it's grasp of
death laid hand on the people of this
land who knew what might be the end?
So a1fcnof was weighed and the in
fected ship sailed into quarantine.
where she will remain until the living
germs of death wither in the fumes
that will penetrate every nook and
crevice of hold and cabin.
Europe is now terror stricken at the
alarming advances of this dread dis
ease. In the temperate climes of Italy
and Austria it has been stalking
through the land, leaving in its path
! scores Of blackened victims But few
| live to tell of the pain and dread that
seizes its victims after it has once laid
hold. The disease in itself is a ma
| lignant and fatal contagious fever In
early ages it ragged throughout Egypt
and the Levant and spread it's devas-
tating epidemics throughout almost the
whole of Europe. So fearful are it's
ravages that it has teen an obstacle to
the growth of countries and has time
and again turned back the tide of civil
ization. 1t first appeared in Constan-
tinople in A. D. 544, and when the peo-
pie of that land looked upon it's results
and upon the bodies Of it's victims they
named it ''the pest, 'the black death"
and "the great mortality From that
date the germs of the disease seemed
to have taken a firm hold upon the
country and many opidemics have
taken place since then, forty-five hav-
ing occurred in the seventeenth CEN
tury.
Twenty-Five millions Of people, it is
estimated, have fallen under the blow
of 1.-The black DEATH the majority of
whom were counted among the dead
during the existence of less than a.
dozen epidemics-those which occurred
at London in 1865, Copenhagen in 1712,
Marseilles in 1920. Moscow in 1771,
Malta in 1913, Selecia in 1919, Bulgaria
in 1828-29, Egypt in 1874 among the
Arabs of North Africa in 1857 Mesopo-
tamia in 1857 and in Persian Kurdistan
in 1871.
The plague is now looked upon an a
zymotic disease, dependent upon poi
sonous atmospheric conditions. The
germs of the plague gain access to the
blood, rapidly multiply and destroy its
nutritive elements. In malignity and
nature it is not unlike tyDhus fever. It's
propagation is said to occur by direct
or indirect contagion, and is greatly
assisted by overcrowding, uncleanIiness
and residence in damp marshy coun-
tries.
After exposure to the disease there is
a latency of from two to seven days,
then four stages of the disease follow
in rapid succession. AS termed by the
scientists who have made laborious in
vestigations, the first stage is called
invasion, the second fever, the third
local phlegmons, and last collapse or
conyalescence. Lassitude and en-
feeblement of mind and body are
precedent symptoms; shivering, head
ache, vertigo, vomiting, hieh fever,
great prostration and sometimes un-
consciousness. tell of its definite onset.
Enlargement of lymphatic glands and
carbuncles mark the advance of the
disease, and then, in the fatal cases.
and they are in the large majority.
purple spots and black discolorations
| mottle the skin. Hemorrhage into the
lungs and from the lungs is another
complication and was a frequent
| symptom of ''the black death" in the
Middle Ages. William Perner states
that sits duration is from two to ten
days and convalescence is slow. 1t is
/ prevented by hygienic measures and
public quarantine, but its treatment.
beyond general measures Of stimulation
and nutritive support, ava1ls little.
Such is the history of the black
death" ship infected with its germ
of death has reached our shores, but
1 tha nrompt measures of the health au-
thorities will stamp 1t out and turn
away the danger Of its dread results.