but the same were found in the atmosphere over | try and oppressive, and that it is usually most a sewer. It does not follow, however, that because nothing has been discovered in the air, that fluid is therefore incapable of transmitting cholera poison. All that we can assert is, that our present means of observation have not enabled us to detect any thing of the kind.

violent when the weather is the hottest. Thus Vera Cruz expects it as regularly as the summer itself; New Orleans suffers from it very frequently; Charleston not so often; and Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, only occasionally, at long and irregular intervals. Still it must be observed that there is a limit to this rule of progression. Until within a few years the Equator offered an invisible but an insurmountable barrier to the advance of yellow fever. It is only during the present epidemic that this pestilence has succeeded in invading Peru. It has also been noticed that the very hottest parts of the yellow-fever zone often escape entirely, as if there was a particular point which could not be passed without, as it were, burning up the germ of the epidemic. Furthermore, it must be borne in mind, that the rule is by no means absolute, even for those regions in which this fever prevails, and that it sometimes makes its assaults in an unusually cool summer.

The recent studies of Pettenkofer and Thiersch go to show that the emanations from the body of a cholera patient must undergo a certain degree of fermentation before they can induce disease. Thiersch experimented on mice by giving them daily the two-thousandth part of a grain of matter discharged from cholera patients. He found that while this was recent it produced no effect upon the animals, but that after it became from six to nine days old it brought on symptoms of cholera. Thirty, out of thirty-four mice experimented upon, sickened, and twelve died. Pettenkofer, who was appointed by the Bavarian Government to investigate this subject, finds three factors necessary to produce cholera: first, a germ or ferment; second, a soil to receive it; and, third, a miasma generated from the combi- Next, humidity, which plays so important a nation, which is the active cause of the disease. part in the causation of cholera, shows itself as Hence it follows that any thing which will an agent in the production of yellow fever. The prevent fermentation and putrefaction will, if history of the disease leads us to lay no little applied skillfully and sufficiently, arrest the pro- stress upon this cause. The dew-point is, as gress of cholera. Chloride of lime and sulphu- we have seen, generally high, yet the disease ric acid are efficient disinfectants. The expe- has occurred when this elevation was not rerience of two of the Bavarian jails corroborates markable. Dr. Barton, of New Orleans, conthe opinion of the two observers whose results siders it necessary that a high temperature have been quoted. An individual dying in the should coincide with this high dew-point. prison of Kaisheira introduced cholera there. puts the dew-point of yellow fever at from 70° But one other case occurred, although the pris- to 80°, and says that should the thermometer on was in a very unfavorable situation. The fall below 70° and the dew-point descend to near escape of the remaining five or six hundred pris- 60°, the fever must cease. Other observers, oners is attributed, by Liebig, to the early and however, have noticed but little difference beliberal use of disinfectants. At Ebrach, on the tween the dew-point in yellow-fever seasons and contrary, where this precaution was not imme-in periods of perfect freedom from that disease. diately adopted, fifteen per cent. of the inmates died of the pestilence.

He

Some physicians attach no little importance to the electrical condition of the atmosphere; but so little is known about that subject that it is idle to speculate upon it.

This method of propagation, it will be perceived, is wholly different from what is commonly understood by contagion; and any arguments After the meteorological conditions come what leveled against the strict contagionists must fail Dr. Barton calls the terrene. Few facts are so to convict of error those who believe in this well established as the influence of filth and form of communication from man to man. overcrowding upon the development of the disfar as our present experience goes, therefore, ease in question. It almost always breaks out we have reason to believe that cholera may be, in those parts of cities in which many people reand often is, generated by local causes, but that side in one house, and where little attention is its usual mode of transmission is human inter-paid to cleanliness. Sailors, and the hangerson about sailors' boarding-houses, with the dis

course.

So

We come now to inquire into the propagation solute, filthy, and idle population that crowd the of yellow fever. Here again we find a wordy lanes and alleys in the neighborhood of the battle raging between two factions, one insist-wharves of a maritime city, are peculiarly liable ing that this pestilence is always imported; the to its attacks. other equally positive that this is never the case, and that the disease is invariably the product of local causes. We shall first examine the local causes, and then consider the question of importation.

The influence of animal and vegetable decomposition upon the spread of yellow fever is indisputable. The putrid water of the Cove in Baltimore, with its mantle of green slime broken by bubbles of fetid gas from the bottom, and its The first and most important of these is heat. floating islands of dead dogs, was a most poA glance at the map will show that yellow fever tent agent in the induction of yellow fever. is essentially a disease of hot climates; that it The men who were employed to clean it out prevails only where the summers are often sul-were almost stifled with its effluvia, and the in

habitants of its shores died in great numbers of | in New Orleans, chiefly upon the great quantity

the fever. The cellars that sent up such a deadly gas from the pools of water which filled them as to kill the very flies hovering over them, were recognized by Dr. Drysdale as efficient causes of the disease. The putrid meats and the offensive liquor which covered them, had no little influence in inducing yellow fever in New York.

Vegetable decomposition has been even more suspected. The habit of filling up vacant lots with rice offal, has, it is believed, produced more than one epidemic in Charleston. In Baltimore, the epidemic of 1819 seems to have been very much influenced by putrefying vegetable matter. On the wharf where it first broke out, the infected warehouses opened back upon an alley filled with rotting shavings; and it is worthy of remark that the adjoining wharf, the buildings on which presented no windows, but only a blind wall to the infectious alley, entirely escaped. On the Point, in one of the districts which suffered most, the earthen bed of the street was deeply covered with putrid shavings and chips, which became so offensive that the authorities ordered their removal. The poor fellows who undertook this unpleasant duty were among the early victims of the pestilence. wharves, also, which suffered most from yellow fever, were made up, in great part, of vegetable

matter.

The

of excavation which was going on in and around the city. As early as the 6th of June, he exhibited to the New Orleans Academy of Science a chart of the mortality of that place from the year 1787, and stated that, "judging from the past, if the facts exhibited by the chart were not merely coincidences, he was compelled to apprehend that the present year would be marked by a great augmentation of disease. The simultaneous construction of new railroads in and around the city, the digging of a new basin of vast extent in the rear of the city, the enlargement of the Canal Carondolet, the open sewers, scarcity of water, insufficient drainage, and the practice of spreading over the streets the horrible filth of the gutters, to fester and reek in the sun-if all these are continued during the hot months, with the proper meteorological conditions, our exemption from a severe epidemic should almost seem miraculous." The subsequent epidemic at Savannah was attributed to the excavation of about a mile of trenches for water-pipes, to the raising of a number of vessels which had been sunk for years in the river, and to the great amount of filth spread over the banks.

After giving full weight to all these facts, and admitting the validity of the deductions made from them, may we not ask, Is this all? Is the extension of yellow fever fully accounted for by such accidents as these? Dr. Barton has called the meteorological and the terrene conditions "the two blades of the shears of fate," but where are we to seek for the rivet which holds them together? Is it not asking a little too much, to require the public to believe that the two sets of causes set out on a tour from the tropics, and, starting at Rio in 1850, advanced to Demerara in 1851, to the West India Islands and Vera Cruz in 1852, to New Orleans and Mobile in 1853, to Savannah, Augusta and Charleston in 1854, to Norfolk and Portsmouth in 1855, and to New York in 1856. Is not this, to say the least of it, a very remarkable series of coincidences? Furthermore, how does it happen that this geographical progression was so regular, as well during the cold August of 1856, as during the hot and humid summer of 1853? Was New York so much cleaner in the last-named year? The meteorological conditions were certainly not wanting, for deaths from exhaustion by heat were never more frequent, the humidity of the air was great, and the thermometer was higher than in New Orleans. Had yellow fever then occurred in the city, there is no doubt that the items of a very pretty catalogue of local causes could have been picked up in the neighborhood of the Washington Market.

The disturbance of the soil during the hot months, is a cause of disease strongly insisted on by Dr. Barton in his report on the yellow fever of 1853 in New Orleans. He traces many epidemics to extensive grading of the streets, to laying gas-pipes, digging canals, and other exposures of the soil. To such an extent is this opinion received at the South, that some of the cities have ordinances against digging during the hot months. It must be acknowledged that many facts have been accumulated which show a connection between this disturbance of the soil and the outbreak of fever. It is equally certain, however, that numerous epidemics have occurred, in which no unusual disturbance of the soil took place. The kind of soil disturbed, also, should be taken into consideration. No one will be disposed to doubt that the rich alluvial mud of New Orleans, made up of the detritus of the Mississippi, or the made ground of Charleston, composed chiefly of a great mass of putrefying rice-chaff, might, if exposed to the hot, moist air of a Southern summer, generate fevers of the most malignant type. It would be difficult, however, to induce the same apprehension with regard to the clean sand and gravel of Baltimore, or the rocky detritus of which the soil of upper New York is composed. The made ground of the Battery, however, might, if dis- There still remains an element in the chain turbed during a hot and sultry summer, be ca- of causation to be considered. Human interpable of inflicting no little mischief upon the course, whether known as contagion, communihealth of the American metropolis. A striking cability, or importation, is regarded by some as illustration of the importance of this cause is to the main agent in producing this disease, while be found in the fact that Dr. Barton based his by others it is utterly repudiated. The truth prediction of the impending pestilence of 1853, | will probably be found to lie, as usual, between

these two extremes of opinion.

Those who It is not, however, necessary to travel to the deny communicability, labor very hard to prove Cape de Verd Islands in order to find evidences the local origin of the pestilence. This is a of the importation of yellow fever. The last work of supererogation, for it is not and can | year's epidemic on the shores of New York Bay not be denied. The important question, it must can not be interpreted in any other way. Early be remembered, is not, Does the disease always in the summer, yellow fever was found to exist, or spread from man to man? but, Can it ever ex- to have existed, on board of many of the vessels tend in that way? For, if it be proved that this from the West Indies. These were quarantined fever has in any instance been communicated or at the usual spot, and soon a forest of masts imported, the practical rules of its prevention grew up around the anchorage. The sick were are the same as though it were always so trans-admitted to the hospital, and, as their numbers mitted. increased, cases of the fever occurred among the There is no room here for the full discussion persons employed about the Quarantine buildof a question which has covered so many thou-ing. Uneasiness being experienced at the proxsand pages. We must be content with present-imity of the infected vessels to the city, they ing the matter in a striking light by the state- were removed lower down the bay, where the ment of actual occurrences.

channel is narrower, and anchored in the neighborhood of Fort Hamilton. After a time, yellow fever broke out on the shore in the immediate vicinity of the ships, and slowly spread over a narrow strip of land from New Utrecht to Gowanus, and so into Brooklyn. A few cases occurred in New York, which are said to be clearly traceable to the shipping.

The most important of the histories of the rise and progress of this fever, and that which has been most hotly discussed, is the account of the yellow fever at Bona Vista, one of the Cape de Verd Islands. In November, 1844, the Eclair steamer, belonging to the British navy, sailed to the western coast of Africa, off which she cruised until the middle of August. During It is quite probable that some doughty adthis time, undoubted yellow fever made its ap- vocate of non-importation will discover some pearance on board of her, and she made for the frightful "local causes" about the infected disCape de Verd Islands. She arrived at Bona tricts, which have hitherto strangely escaped Vista on the 21st of August. It has been as- every one's notice. Mud-puddles, flats, seaserted that this island was subject to yellow fe- weed, and dead fish, will duly shock his nerves. ver; but we have the most positive testimony It will be difficult, however, to persuade any one that for thirty-seven years, at least, this pesti- who is acquainted with the shores of that beaulence had never been known on the island. The tiful bay that these spots were any more unfahealth of the place before the arrival of the in- |vorably situated than many parts of the Jersey fected ship was good. It is asserted by some, shore which entirely escaped. The difference who wish to avoid the force of the facts of this between the two was simply the presence of epidemic, that it was about the time when an the infected shipping-a fatal difference for outbreak might be expected. On the contrary, the Long Islanders. It will be well for any it was unusually late for a latitude so near the who would account for this upon purely "meequator. About the middle of September the teorological and terrene" principles, to bear in first cases of black vomit occurred among the mind the character of the last summer. There military guard, who came in contact with the was at no time any great continuance of heat. sick landed from the steamer. The next case The month of August was decidedly and unwas a soldier, the comrade of the two first vic- comfortably cool. It would be difficult to imtims, the next his nurse, the next the fellow-agine a season more unpropitious to the devellodger of the nurse. From these cases the dis-opment of yellow fever. ease spread through the village, and gradually From what has been said, we think it clear extended itself over the island. Never was that yellow fever is greatly dependent upon there a disease traced so minutely, from man to local causes for its development; that filth, man, as this. So strong a case of communica- dampness, heat, and overcrowding always agbility is it, that the opponents of this notion have gravate it, always favor its invasion, and often no other resource but to impugn the facts. They produce it. But we believe it to be equally therefore cite Dr. King, a decided non-conta- clear that yellow fever may be and has been gionist, who was afterward sent out by Sir Will- imported; may be and has been transmitted iam Burnett to investigate the matter. He dis- from man to man. We see nothing unphilocovered several local causes, and criticised some sophical in such a conclusion. If putrefying of the testimony upon which his predecessor, animal and vegetable matter, spoiled meat, rotDr. M'Williams, based his report; but it is re- ten shavings, foul water, can induce the dismarkable that his facts, though he draws a dif- ease, why may it not be reproduced by the ferent conclusion from them, do not materially emanations from bodies affected with it-emandiffer from those collected in the first report. ations which are putrefying more rapidly than It is certainly necessary to abandon all our no- the meat, the shavings, or the water? To say tions of cause and effect before we can believe that it is not always transmitted in this way, is that a fever thus originating, and thus spread-only to say that the circumstances of its develing, in an unfrequented island, is wholly inde- opment are not always present. We know, for pendent of human intercourse. example, that many patients left Norfolk for

Baltimore during the epidemic of 1855, and | hend the spontaneous outburst of a pestilence.

Its importation is easily guarded against by a proper system of Quarantine-a method of protection which should not be set aside without grave reasons.

that no instance of the propagation of the disease in the latter city occurred; but we also know that no sooner had the inhabitants of an infected district in Portsmouth crossed over to a filthy, crowded row in Norfolk than yellow Dr. Dugas, of Augusta, has pointed out the fever broke out in that row. The germ of the necessity of extending quarantine regulations disease, the ferment, the infection-call it what to other transports besides ships. After showyou will-found a suitable soil in one place, ing that steam-boats conveyed it up navigable but not in the other. So the spores of a fungus | rivers, and railroad cars transported it to inland may be wafted by the wind, and deposited on towns, he recommends a sealing of the hatchthe hard rock, or the plowed field, or the way of steam-boats, or a prohibition of their dusty road, without germinating and reproduc- approach within certain fixed limits. As for ing the species; but let them reach the rich railway cars, apprehending justly the possibility black mould of a decaying log lying in the of the transportation of infected air in close shade of a forest, which shuts out the sun by its vehicles, he advises the authorities "to prevent multitudinous leaves, and preserves a perpetual from entering the city any box-car or closed dampness beneath its sheltering boughs, and car of any kind, whether containing merchanimmediately hosts of little caps, mounted on dise, baggage, or the mails, which may come their fleshy stalks, overtop the green mosses from an infected district. It will be with the that hide the crumbling wood. This fever- railroad companies to determine whether they germ, whatever it may be, requires conditions will put their freight upon open trucks in for its full development; but who is sufficient-Charleston, or do so at a point nearer Augusly acquainted with the arcana of pestilence ta- but this should not be less than three to be able to say, at any given time of any miles." given place, that those conditions are not present?

After an epidemic has broken out, there is but one public measure of any avail. The inIt is always absurd to argue in favor of any fected district should be immediately evacuated, particular theory which requires facts, not opin- a cordon thrown around it, all intercourse with ions, for its support, by citing the number of it prohibited, and its inhabitants removed to a illustrious names which are found among its purer air. The beneficial effects of this course advocates; for a single hostile fact will out-have been more than once clearly proved. We weigh any amount of friendly authorities. Yet need only refer our readers to the accounts we this line is often adopted by those who deny have given of the energetic action of the authe possibility of importation, and we are favor-thorities of New York, and recall to their memed by a formidable catalogue of illustrious phy-ories the success of the encampment system sicians who have been converted to the doc-adopted at Baltimore, to convince them of the trines of non-contagion. It is remarkable that propriety of this measure. they have not seen how easily this argument could be turned against them. If there is a city on the continent which is unwilling to tol-ers of our race-is daily gaining ground among erate the slightest interference with its trade, that city is New York. Yet, in that great commercial metropolis, with every mercantile inducement to disbelieve the doctrine of importation, we find that the majority of the leading physicians are fully convinced of its truth.

The sanitary measures to be adopted in view of an approaching pestilence are involved in what has been already said of the causes of epidemics. Of course, man is powerless over the mutations of the seasons. The bonfires, the fumigations, the combustion of tar, are worse than useless. All experience has shown that they are of no value whatever; and attention bestowed on them only diverts the public mind from those sanitary measures which have real efficacy. We have no reason to believe that the meteorological conditions alone can produce any particular form of pestilence. They must be conjoined with those impurities of soil and of water, that crowding and that bad ventilation so common in all cities. These certainly are under the control of man; and if they are removed, we have no reason to appre

The belief in the power of man to control these deadly plagues-the wholesale slaughter

those who have investigated the phenomena of epidemics. The importance of the subject certainly demands for it the careful attention of the public. It was in order to secure such attention that these articles were commenced. If they should prove successful in inducing their readers to think seriously of these scourges, and the means of arresting their devastations, the author will consider that his time has been profitably employed. Just now something is needed to arouse the public to a sense of the vast importance of proper sanitary regulations, for there can be no doubt that we are at present in a vortex of yellow fever, which, if it follow the laws of previous epidemics, must be expected to hover around our seaboard cities for five or six years to come. We can not close this last paper without raising a warning voice against that false security which may prove fatal. It can not be too strongly impressed upon the public mind that all the cities from Charleston to Portland are in danger of the invasions of this disease. It has prevailed in past years, as we have already shown, along the whole coast; and there is no perceptible

"Oh, charming!" said Mary Jane; "the thing a man ever had. very thing!"

I turned to Blossom with an air of triumph, as much as to say, You see my daughter's tastes, Mr. Blossom.

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