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236
rence of the various cases, circumstances of attack, &c.,
all require consideration in connection with this list,
but cannot be dealt with here on account of want of
space. It will suffice to note that the only area in
which the dates of attack indicated, any tendency to
epidemicity, was that between Harrow Road and the
Canal Basin. The cases were investigated with much
care but no common factor could be discovered, except
the climatic conditions and the neighbourhood of the
dust wharves, pendant to these two being a great
plague of flies. It is remarkable that the area in
question had until the past autumn, enjoyed a comparative
immunity from infectious disease. Many of
the cases were on one 'milk walk', the carrier of which
had some diarrhoea in the summer. The cases were
however too few and too widely separated in point of
time to permit of any suspicion of infection from
that source.
The possibility of direct infection from person to
person is becoming more suspected as time goes on.
The matter was briefly dealt with in the Report for
1898 (page 29).