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9
to one of these articles of diet—namely, the oyster—was
introduced at a later date to public notice in the columns
of the press, evidence came to hand from medical men
located in all parts of the country, which amply confirmed
the opinions I had already expressed upon this subject.
In like manner the connection between watercress and
Typhoid can now be considered as definitely established.
Besides a number of cases coming under my own notice
which I have collected, and others which have been detailed
to me by medical men in practice, a batch of cases is
reported from a distant part of the empire. An outbreak of
Typhoid recently occurred on board Her Majesty's ship
"Cossack," stationed at Bombay; thirty-three men were
attacked, and in the case of seven the disease had a fatal
termination. The Commission appointed to investigate the
cause of the outbreak declared the disease to be due to the
consumption of watercress. The men infected had eaten a
quantity of watercress taken from a bed in the vicinity of
Parel, a suburb of Bombay. The watercress was found to
be growing in a liquid medium of sewage-contaminated
water, the bed receiving sewage drained from houses
where Typhoid fever at the time was prevalent.
That these articles of diet, namely, oysters and watercress,
which are largely eaten in London, are, under certain
circumstances, sewage bearers, is capable of demonstration.
Watercress eaten by people residing in Lambeth, who
afterwards became the subjects of Typhoid fever, was
grown on the outskirts of a sewage farm and in a medium
of liquid sewage and water, and conveyed to the consumer
without being previously washed. Oysters eaten by
parishioners where a like sequence of events followed, had
been fattened especially for London consumption in the
channel of a tidal river, the stream of which being shallow