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permeating all classes, may be expected to take an increasing
interest in the preservation of the health of their stock; and,
above all, to the strict performance of their duty by Local
authorities, who are responsible for the due carrying out of
the provisions of the Dairies, Cowsheds, and Milkshops Order,
which enable them to make regulations for prescribing precautions
to be taken by purveyors of milk against infection or
contamination. The Order enacts that " if at any time disease
exists among the cattle in a dairy or cowshed, the milk of a
diseased cow therein shall not be mixed with other milk, and
shall not be sold or used as human food."
DIPHTHERIA.
Diphtheria was very prevalent in several districts of London
during the greater part of 1888. For some years past this
disease has been on the increase, and in 1887 the deaths were
961, the corrected decennial average number being 781.In 1888
the deaths rose to 1,301, being 549 above the average, and 92
in excess of the number of deaths from scarlet fever. The
deaths in the four quarters respectively were 415, 523,238, and
125. In this year diphtheria was, for the first time in my
experience, distinctly endemic in the North-west portion of
Kensington contiguous to the parish of Paddington, from which
it would appear to have extended. Daring the first quarter 32
deaths from this cause were registered in Paddington, and five
only in the Town sub-district of Kensington. Other adjacent
parishes appear to have been as comparatively free from the
disease as Kensington. In the second quarter the deaths
registered in Paddington were 20, those in Kensington being
nine, including eight in the Town sub-district. In the third
quarter the registered deaths were 23, those in Kensington, still
in the Town sub-district, being also 23. In the fourth quarter
the deaths in Paddington were again 23, while those in (the
Town sub-district of) Kensington rose to 28. In this quarter,
moreover, a marked increase in mortality from diphtheria was