The Hawaiian gazette., 1900-01-23

rDpcan war. with Japan and the United
States as not Impossible participants
.H
Duty or THE COUNCIL or SrATf.
Every measure short OF the BURNING
Of Chinatown Is merely palliative. We
may get the people away from there
but the bacilli Of the plague will re-
main, multiplying In the 1lth and
threatening a new outbreak In FUTURE
or the gradual spread OF the old NAL
ady. what good funigation would do
whore The earth Is poisoned may bel
judged by ones common sense. 1t isl
not even certain that fumigation would
cleanse the houses of bacteria seeing
the iil-success the Board Of Health has
had in its experiments with merchan
disc. Nor could the town be saved by
the extension OF the sewers. Sewer
pipe viii not take away a polluted soil
and the reek Of plague-smitten floors
and walls. It will have its function
with other things in the great work of
making Honolulu wholesome and
sanitary place in future but it cannot
meet the emergency now Only the
torch and the coal oil can do that.
The Council OF State will convene
again to-day to consider the appropria
ton of 100000 or more to settle mer
chandise claims; for recent cases of in
lection show that merchandise from
Chinatown, however fumigated It may
be, Is one of the most dangerous
sources of disease BY such means the
plague has crossed Fort street and en-
tered the residence districts. Unless
this property goes up in smoke along
with the buildings that have housed 1t,
We shall not get rid of the Black Death.
Every doctor who knows anything
knows that; every inspector who has
seen the goods from Chinatown must
believe ii.
There are those who grudge the cost,
among them, apparently, the able Min
lister of Finance, whose cherished sur
plus Is in peril. But we urge the Coun
ell of State to remember that the de.
struction of single cargo of island
sugar at port of entry because OF the
plague would cost Hawaii more than
all the Chinese merchandise is worth.
If 1t gets out on the Coast that the
authorities here, for the sake of keep
ing an extraordinary sum in the public
treasury, have neglected one of the
most obvious of safeguards, woe betide
us. We shall then have to meet a
quarantine barrier more insurmount-
able than Chinese wall; sugar stocks
will sink below sea level; our tourist
trade will stop for a long time to come
TRANSATLANTIC steamers will avoid us;
we shall be isolated and accursed. The
duty good citizens owe Hawaii is to
spend every dollar of the surplus If
need be in srbduing the pestllence, a
thing that has already done more
harm to us than the surplus, If turned
over intact, with Mr.. Damon's com
pliments, could do the Treasury of the
United States.
| The Advertiser in appealing for thor
ough work has the backing, so far rs ii
can find out, of every citizen save a
few of those who own shacks or goods
in Chinatown and those to whom a
healthy surplus is dearer than a healthy
city. In this case thorough work
means four things: the stoppage OF the
! handling and transfer of infected mer-
chandise; the burning of that mer-
chandise: the obllteration of every
| thing in Chinatown that has four walls
and a floor; the complete disinfection
of the site. And the necessary antece-
dent to all this Is haste. The Council
of State should not forget that the
bacilll of the plague may be increasing
by thousands every day as they did once
upon time in Milan whore neither
those who journeyed to the mountains
nor laid of shore on ships were able
to escape their ravages. Breeding fast
in festered pits the deadly germs were
carried here and there on every wind
and on every article of merchandise
until more than half the Milanese were
dead. The bacllli of the plague are
breeding the same way here. Shall 1t
be said that the statesmen of Hawaii
weighed dollars against the chance of
destroying their breeding-places and
extirpating them.
Tax about the cost of destroying all
the Chinese merchandise is an affront
to thrift as we'll as humanity. Think
of the cost of caring for these goods
the warehouses, the lumber. the wages
for carpenters and draymen, the teams,
the guards. the fumigation, the double
handling TO and from fumigating sta
tions, the cost OF storage; then think
of the personal danger to the men,
some of them our best young citizens
who are compelled to do the handling;
finally think OF the peril of some future