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commenced in March, simultaneously, at Hackney, where at
Homerton the Eastern Hospital is situated, and in the adjacent
parishes of Islington, Bethnal Green and Shoreditch. The
Tables C to I shew the incidence of Small-pox in every district in
London for the greater part of the year, as indicated by the
admissions at hospitals; they shew also that Small-pox had lingered
in Hackney through the winter of 1883-4, and that nowhere else
was the epidemic so severe as in that parish. Dr. Tripe accounts
for the sudden outburst at Hackney and other parishes, in March,
on a theory of "eddies" in the air. These eddies, he believes,
whisked the contagium out at the hospital windows—with what
results we know. He has shewn that the eddies were recorded
at Greenwich and at Kew also. Their influence, therefore, must
have operated at Deptford and Stockwell where hospitals were in use;
but, as we have seen, they did not cause any spread of Small-pox
in those localities. From Hackney and the other parishes above
named Small-pox spread, until every part of the Metropolis had
become invaded. In Hackney alone, some 1,200 cases were
recorded in 1884, and of this number, 250, to say nothing of
concealed and unrecognized cases, were treated at home. What
influence these 250 cases may have had on the spread and the
continuance of the epidemic, locally, may be inferred from the
fact that on a former occasion an outbreak involving the occurrence
of 52 cases was traced by Dr. Tripe to one home-treated case.
This outbreak was finally suppressed owing to the facilities
afforded by the Eastern Hospital for the isolation of the sick.
Between the end of October, 1883, and the end of September,
1884, (a period of eleven months), 4,361 cases were treated in the
Asylum Board's Hospitals; 791 of the cases were admitted direct
at the Hospital Ships, and 3,570 were admitted in the first
instance at the Hospitals in London. Of these 3,570 cases,
no fewer than 2,107 were admitted at the Eastern Hospital,
as against 1,463 admitted at the other hospitals, five in number.
The great bulk of the 2,107 cases were transferred from the
Eastern Hospital to the Ships or to the Darenth Camp, at an early
period, and while still infective. The Eastern, the South-Western