Rensselaer Republican, Volume 16, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 July 1884 — SPREADING PLAGUE. [ARTICLE]

SPREADING PLAGUE.

The (Cities of Marseilles and Toulon, France, Visited by Grim Asiatic Cholera, r—■ —\ ' r V - A Strong Foothold Gained—Fifty Deaths in Two Days— ■> Thousands Flee. A . [By cable from London.] An alarming outbreak of cholera has occurred in Toulon, Franbe. There have been fifty deaths Bince Saturday, and the rate of mortality has increased each day. A panic has seized upon the people. Eight thousand persons have fled from the city and thousands of residents of the poorer quarters have been ousted from their homes and driven into the suburbs by the police and are now camping in the fields. The bodies of victims of the disease are buried in large trenches and covered with quicklime to kasten their decomposition. None haye been buried in the regular cemeteries for fear of giving opportunity for the infection to spread. Great terror is shown by the inhabitants of the surrounding country upon the approach of any of the refugees from the city, lest they should carry with them the germ of the dreaded malady. A special from Paris says: The Ministry of Commerce has issued a notice that the cholera at Toulon is sporadic, and not Asiatic; that it is due to local infection and, therefore, confined to the place of its origin. At Marseilles there is a cholera scare. Orders have been issued to bury immediately tbe corpses of cholera' victims in deep trenches, which will be covered with chloride of lime. No bodies will be allowed to be taken to the churches.. * Is at Asiatic? India is the home of Asiatic cholera, where it is known to have existed for centuries. In 1817 a particularly violent epidemic, which originated at Jessore, ravaged India for three years, and then spread to China on the east and Persia on the west. By 1823 it had reached Asia Minor and Siberia, and in 1830 it invaded Bussia, appearing in Europe for the first time. The next year it spread throughout all Europe, and eventually crossed the Atlantic to America. The year 1835 saw it in North Africa, and during 1836-7 it continued to appear spasmodically in various parts of Europe. In 1847 another epidemic visited Russia, Germany, England, and France, and. like its predecessor it too crossed to America, whence it spread to the West Indies. In 1850 it again appeared in the East, reaching Europe in 1853, and again coming to the western continent, where its severity was exceedingly great. Finally, in 1865-6, the last visit of the plague wa£ made to Europe, and this time, also, it found the Atlantic no obstacle to its western march. Fortunately, jt was not so deadly on the last occasion as on the previous one. We see from thiß brief statement that each time Europe has been visited hy this scourge it has spread to America. Its course is not always the same, as sometimes it avoids countries that at others it visits, making its way into Eastern Europe at one time from Russia in Asia, and at another, after ravaging Arabia and Syria, invading Turkey and spreading from thence. Early in the month of June last year a mysterious disease made its appearance at Damietta, a town on tbe eastern arm of the Nile, near the point where it enters the Mediterranean. At first little or no notice was taken of its presence, as its ravages were chiefly confifled to the rabble, but as the days wont on it spread with such rapidity that at last it commanded attention. An investigation was then set afoot as the result of which the epidemic was pronounced to be Asiatic cholera, and this opinion received official confirmation from the report of the Egyptian sanitary commission, published about the beginning of the last Week in the month. No sooner was the decision of the commission made public than a panic set in, which was by no means allayed when the Egyptian medical chief at the place flatly contradicted its members, and pronounced the plague an ordinary fever of . virulent type. People fled from the stricken town in hundreds, availing themselves of any and every means of transportation that would convey them to a place of safety. A sanitary cordon of Egyptian troops was drawn around Damietta after this, and, if not at once, at least a little later on, orders were issued to 6hoot fugitives who might attempt to break through—a heartless precaution that was subsequently adopted at other towns visited by the plague. The panic was not confined to the immediate scene of the outbreak, but spread all over Lower Egypt, and Europeans everywhere throughout the country made haste to get away. In Algeria the Governor prevented the annual caravan of Mecca pilgrims from setting out. By the beginning of July it was said that, with the exception of a few devoted medical men, all Europeans had deserted the delta towns and villages. So numerous were the deaths that the bodies of the victims were hastily buried under a few inches of sand, which blown away by the wind, left them exposed to breed new diseases. At the end of this month—just two months from the appearance at Damietta —16,000 persona had died. Prompt measures were taken by nearly all European states to guard against an invasion of the plague, England being the sole exception. Nothing in the dispatches published lately indicates how the infection reached Toulon, its appearance there being, so far as is yet known, surrounded by as much mystery as the outbreak at Damietta.