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no means necessarily coincides with the highest
readings of the air-thermometer, but the temperature
of the soil is the essential point and it is
found that the summer rise of diarrhoeal mortality
does not commence until the mean temperature
recorded by the 4-foot earth thermometer has
attained somewhere about 56 degrees F." Rainfall
is operative mainly by its effect upon the temperature
of the soil. Diarrhoeal mortality is greater
in dry seasons, and less in wet seasons.
The work of the Sanitary Department has Sanitary Work
been very considerable and very thorough during the
last few years and an impartial inspection of the
various reports presented from time to time by the
officers will amply confirm this. Taken in conjunction
with that of the Surveyor's Department—
for the two are working to the same end—the result
is a great improvement in the general health and
life conditions of the residents in this district.
The enlightened policy that this Council has
now pursued for many years past is bringing its
own reward, and the general health of the locality
has never been iri a better condition than of late.
Cleanliness is the key note, but cleanliness has to
be enforced, and by the vigorous carrying out of the
provisions of the Public Health Act and the other
sanitary ordinances with a steady unremitting perseverance
on the lines hitherto adopted, a result
has been obtained that is the best of all encouragements
for a continuance of the same policy.
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