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population has undoubtedly increased every year, and must be
considerably larger now than five years ago.
We can scarcely expect so low a death rate again for
several years, as the weather was such as ordinarily co-exists with
an unusually small death rate, viz., cool and rainy in June, July,
and August, and warm in November. It is true that the mean
temperature in the four first months of the year was low, but
this arose not so much from very low temperatures, which are
very destructive to the very young and the very old, as from
the comparative absence of sunshine and of corresponding
high daily temperatures, which in ordinary years counterbalance
low night temperatures.
The most prevalent zymotic disease was diphtheria, which
occurred nearly all over the district, in various localities, and
was epidemic for a short time in the vicinity of the Detmold
Road Board Schools. It rarely attacked more than one family in a
house, although in some instances as many as four suffered in
one family. The Detmold Road Schools are situate on sloping
ground on the south of Mount Pleasant Lane, and the outbreak
was considered by several medical practitioners to have arisen
from emanations given off by the disturbance of the soil in
relaying, cleansing, or repairing drains and sewers in the
locality. The soil on which many of the houses where the
patients resided was made up several years ago with ashes and
other refuse, covered over with dry rubbish. The foundations
of the houses were laid on concrete, as well as all the area
within the walls, and I examined them on many occasions while
the houses were being built. When trenches were cut in the
ground this year for drainage purposes, offensive emanations
were given off, partly from the soil, but chiefly from drains and
sewers repaired. It was these emanations to which, as well as
those alleged to come from the newly disturbed soil, that the
origin of the outbreak was attributed by some persons. This
opinion was clearly erroneous, although perhaps the offensive
smells might possibly have exercised some injurious effects in