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53
membered by the gentlemen into whose hands this Report will fall, and in
the words, as closely as I can recollect:—
Chairman. "When will this dreadful scourge slacken? When will it
come to an end ?"
Medical Officer. "This scourge is primarily atmospheric; and as soon as
the wind shifts to the west, south, or south-west, and rain falls, from that
hour it will be checked."
Chairman. "Will that make all the difference ?"
Medical Officer. "That will make all the difference. I will stake my
reputation, as Medical Officer, that as soon as these changes shall come to
pass, immediately the disease and mortality will subside."
What followed is now a matter of Medical history.
We have seen what the East End of London has been during a pestilence
in the past; it now remains for all concerned, having authority, to endeavour
to guard l the future. As an effort in this direction, I beg to submit the following
propositions, of a practical character, to your earnest and earliest consideration:—
1. That the water supplied from the works at Old Ford, from the facts
adduced, both in point of condition and distribution, may, for years previously,
be regarded as identical in character with that in use during the epidemic of
1866; and that there is not the slightest evidence whatever to show that
that the use of this water had anything to do with originating, exaggerating,
or brining about what has been called the Cholera " explosion."
2. That it has been shown, beyond a question, that there is to be found in
the heart of the Cholera "explosion" field, an amount of organic filth, probably
unequalled by all the rest of the metropolis; that it is a fact to be
noted, that the highest per centage of mortality occurred in the centre of the
convergence of this tilth, the Limehouse district; and that, while duly
observing the digression of localities from the standard of sanitary laws, as a
rule, the dicta, it is considered, are sufficient to show that the meteorlogy
played an energetic part in its action on this filth, and in this way intensified
or modified tho character of the pestilence throughout the East districts.
3. That the great sanitary evils, in a degree peculiar to the East of
London, arising from large bodies of polluted water, and of sewage, developed
in the form of gases and vapours, are a source of nuisance and danger