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the parochial Medical Officers, and other persons whoes
duties brought them into direct relation with the poor, in
order that I might through them obtain early intelligence
of the outbreak, or spread of infectious diseases; to issue a
handbill (see Appendix) of instructions with regard to
“Measures to be adopted against the spread of Fevers,"
and to employ the Inspectors of Nuisances as far as possible,
or as far as might be necessary in the inspection and superintendence
and disinfection of fever-stricken localities.
Of these two diseases, scarlet fever alone became widely
epidemic, relapsing fever scarcely showed itself; at all
events I never got any evidence (with one exception) that
there were more than a few isolated cases in different parts
of the parish, never (with the same exception) that there
were even a limited epidemic outbreak.
The exception here referred to was furnished by the
Workhouse; which, notwithstanding the freedom of the
parish generally from the disease, continued week after
week (from the 15th October) to send to the London Fever
Hospital a large number of cases of relapsing fever—a larger
number of cases, I believe, not only than any other Workhouse
in the South of London, but than any other London
Workhouse, excepting only those of Whitechapel and
St. Giles's. This remarkable circumstance, however, was
clearly due to the fact that the disease was prevailing
among the tramps who were being daily received into the
Workhouse; the great majority of the patients who were
transferred to the Fever Hospital were persons who had
not slept in the parish until they were received into the
Workhouse, and who were sent off either at once or within