Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1905-08-11
HAPPENINGS
In MISSISSIPPI
ITEMS OF INTEREST FROM ALL
SECTIONS.
AN EPITOME OF THE NEWS
Culled From the Important Happen
ings Throughout the State During
the Past Week and Reviewed In
Brief.

Jackson. Gov. Vardaman states
with the exception of Gov. Blanch
ard IS oyster boat war, which continues
to rage with manifold fury in the
flood of Baton Rouge dispatches, the
situation in Mississippi is generally
more hopeful.
There seems to be impression
abroad that Mississippi is in an up
heaval of excitement and that the
Louisiana border is bristing with shot
guns and rifles while gunboats ply the
waters of the Mississippi sound, run
ming down all manner of craft On
the high seas and imprisoning cap
tured crews in dungeons on Ship Is
land. Some of the metropolitan pa
pers of the North and East print
lurid headlines about a threatened
armed clash between forces of Mis-
sissippi militia and the Louisiana au
horities.
The, plain facts are that no militia
has been called out as such details
Of militia have been pressed into SER
vice as quarantine guards and the
instructions to these guards are to
obey and execute the orders of the
state board Of health. This is all
they are trying to do and all they are
expected to do. The orders of the
state board of health are as moderate
and as lenient as the situation justl-
fes. These orders in every instance
are based upon the mosquito theory of
yellow fever transmission. No ex-
treme or unnecessary regulations at
fecting freight and passenger traffic
have been promulgated by the state
board. There is no embargo what
ever upon freight that has been fum-
igated to kill mosquitoes; passenger
trains are permitted to stop in the
state and put off passengers who can
show a proper health certificate and
the requirement of this certificate is
simply to prevent any person entering
the state who has been recently ex-
posed to infection. Any one who
can show that he has been out of an
infected district for ten days is per-
mitted to come into the state. The
state board Of health has officially an
nounced its acceptance Of the mo-
squito theory and has recommended
that no other system of quarantine Is
necessary, but some of the munich
pal authorities Of the state, acting on
their own responsibility and of their
own motion have shut up towns
against all freight and passengers from
all points of the compass, and even
the mails are barred In some instances
because the government declines to
fumigate mails upon the old theory
of infection.
"The report that the governor has
called out the state militia is absolu-
tely untrue. There are members OF
the state militia performing the duty
of guards, but they are not acting In
military capacity. I have refused
from the beginning to call out the
national guard for quarantine pur-
poses. -
The public seems to be laboring
under wrong impression concerning
the Mississippi troops now perform
ing duty on the gulf coast. Although
clad in the uniform of the Mississip-
pi national guard, and under strict
military discipline, they are in re,
atty nothing more or less than quar-
antine guards paid by the marine hos
pital service. Privates receive 81 per
day and officers So per day for their
services. This arrangement was au-
thorized by Gov. Vardaman when he
visited the gulf coast 'ast week.