The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1900-01-19
TnE LutilC uF ptStRUC ION.

THE LuGIC IF DIS iKUC ION.
Plague is increasing week by week
with the center of infection in China
town. Seven-elghths of the cases oc-
curing in this city can be traced to
that polluted quarter whence it is car
ried by a variety of means. The late
Mrs. Boardman is now supposed to
have received the poison of the Black
Death in presents sent her by Chinese
friends. The German woman whose
case is reported this morning was ac-
custOmed 10 the proximity of Asiatics.
Merchandise from condemned build
ipgs has spread the germs. Wherever
We find an instance OF plague the chan
ces are that knowledge Of its history
would lead the investigator straight
TO the fostering microDe-pits Of the
Oriental quarter.
IL is four weeks now since the Ad-
vertiser first appealed for the destruc-
zion Of this p.ague-spOt and much has
been done to realize that end. But not
enough. Time has been lost, the prop
er use of which might, by this date,
have cut down the plague mortality to
a merely nominal Inquire. For bear in
m.nd that the bac..L OF the Black
Death are breeding and multiplying all
the while and going out on their in
sidious errands of destruction-going
ont on the shoes ana clothing, perhaps,
OF guards and inspectors and of occa-
sional Chinese; going out in the sys-
TENS of rats which, when afflicted by
this malady, always court the society
of human beings; going out, maybe, on
the sweep of the dust wind. Every
cesspool in the scores that now remain
must be producing It's fresh colonies of
bacteria; every noisome wall and floor
and covert must be nOurishing and de-
veloping them. If the place of infec-
tion-the cradle and arsenal of the
pIague-is permitted to stand for an
other ten days we scarcely doubt that
the pest mortality in Honolulu will
reach ten per diem and perhaps more.
Localities not people are infected,
says the President of the Board of
Health. The Chinese and japanese,
renewed to detention camps, washed
and fumigated, are in good physical
condition. But the locality bounded by
Nuuanu, Queen, River and Kukui
streets, comprising twenty blocks and
ha.l-blocks, is to-day an active manu-
factory of the bubonic scourge. WEI
shall have millions of deadly germs
there If the place, from end to end, is
not purified by fire and that without
delay. 1t is not enough to say that the
Job will be done soon" when each
days waiting adds immeasurably to
.-.e numbers of the bacilli and to the
gravity of public peril. The plague
should be met like an advancing enemy
in line of battle, with prompt attack
There should Ne a daily fire until Chi
natown, brick buildings and all, Is re-
duced to ashes and dead bacilli.
Then 1t will be possible to prevent
the concealment of sickness; practical
BILE to find every cesspool and saturate
q. with acids preparatory to cleaning
1t out with odorless excavators and
filing it with clean black sand and
lime. Then the whole putrid area may
be disinfected and thereafter plowed
up to be blistered on its under crust
with streams of burning coal oil. The
day that Is achieved will, we believe
and predict, be one OF delverance from
the pestilence which at MONDAY and at
Midnight is waited on the very winds
from Chinatown into the households
of the people.
What is more this sweeping dcstruc-
ton will made room for a new and
sanitary Chinatown, separated from
the white mans business quarter by a
wide park and containing every hy-
gienic feature that modern science can
devise. Such an Oriental district would
be worth a million dollars to Honolulu
if for nothing more than the guarantee
it would give of inhospitality to future
maladies that may enter at this port.
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