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The number of deaths from cholera registered last week was 46; a considerable decrease on the two previous weeks. But with this decline of cholera deaths, it is remarkable that the mortality of the week-1339— should have increased by 137 above the calculated average-1202. The subsidence of cholera is concurrent with a fall in the temperature of nearly twenty degrees BlECO the first week in October. Fresh evidence is adduced by the Registrar-General showing the intimate connexion between cholera and water-supply.
"The following is a comparative stafemel t of the mortality of the dis- tricts supplied by the different water companies. It should be premised that the average elevation of the Metropolis above the Trinity water-mark is 39 feet ; and that the mortality from cholera during the thirteen weeks ending November 19, has been 30 to every 100,000 inhabitants. "Hampstead Company—Sources of supply, springs at Hampstead and Kenwood, and two artesian well.; elevation 80 feet ; deaths per 100,000 in- habitants, 5. [This district is also supplied by the New River Company.] "New River—Sources of supply, Chadwell Springs, Hertfordshire, the fiv.er lee, and four wells in Middlesex and Herta ; elevation 76 feet ; deaths 111E 190,0W inhabitants, 9. "Grand Junction—Source of supply, the Thames, 360 feet above Kew Bridge ; elevation 38 feet ; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 13. "Chelsea—Source of supply, the Thames, at Battersea; elevation, 7 feet; deaths per 100,000 persons, 18. "Kent—Source of supply, the Ravensbourne, in Kent; elevation, 18 feet; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 22. "West Middlesex—Source of supply, the Thames at Barnes ; elevation, 72 feet; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 30. "East London—Source of supply, the river Lee, at Lee Bridge ; elevation, 26 feet ; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 33. "Lambeth—Source of supply, the Thames, at Thames Ditton ; elevation, 1 foot ; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 61. [This district is also supplied by the Southwark Company.]
"Southwark—Source of supply, the Thames, at Battersea; elevation, 8 feet; deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, 94. [In a district supplied by the Southwark and Kent Companies, and by ditches and wells, with an elevation of 0 feet, the mortality has been 107 per 100,000.] "
At the meting of the City Commissioners of Sewers, on Tuesday, Mr. John Simoa, the Medical Officer of Health, presented his annual report upon the sanitary condition of London. It is of unusual length, and de- rives additional interest from the comprehensive treatment of the cholera question. In the early part of his report Mr. Simon shows that the an- nual " death-rate " of the inhabitants of the City of London for the last five years has been about 24 in a thousand ; that while for persons exceeding five years the rate is 17 per thousand, that of children under five years is nearly 85; and that the different districts contribute unequally, 18 in the orth-west sub-district of the City, and 29 in the North sub-district. Mr. Simon believes that the rate has considerably decreased (4 per cent) since the City Sewers Commission came into operation. But by far the larger portion of the report relates to the cholera. Mr. Simon shows that experience leads directly to the belief that Asiatic cho- lera will be severely epidemic in London during the third quarter of next year. How far is the City fortified against the danger of its invasion t Mr. Simon points out, that the giant error of London is its present system of drainage : nearly all the ordure and exerementation of the metropolis mingles with the river, and is rolled backward and forward among tho population ; trickles over broad belts of spongy bank at low water, ex- haling fcetor and poison, and at high-water rushes up the sewers, soaking into the soil far and wide. In the low-lying levels some second condition must exist, and that second condition is the atmosphere exhaling from excrement and refuse ; an atmosphere without which cholera would cease.
"The one great pathological fact which I have sought to bring into pro- minence for your knowledge and application is this—That the epidemic pre- valence of cholera does not arise in some new cloud of venom, floating, above reach and control, high over successive lands, and raining down upon them without difference its prepared distillation of death ; but that, so far as scientific analysis can decide, it depends on one occasional phase of an influence which is always about us, on one change of materials which, in their other changes, give rise to other ills ; that these materials, so perilously prone to explode into one or other breath of epidemic pestilence, are the dense exhalations of animal uncleanness, which infect, in varying propor- tion, the entire area of our metropolis ; and that, from the nature of the ease, it must remain optional with those who witness the dreadful in- fliction whether they will indolently acquiesce in their continued and in- creasing liabilities to a degrading calamity, or will employ the requisite skill, science, and energy, to remove from before their thresholds those filthy sources of misfortune."
Mr. Simon recommends the Commission to enforce cleanliness of all kinds as much as they can, between now and next May ; but after that date, the soil, he thinks, should not be disturbed for any purpose. He also recommends the organization beforehand of house-to-house visita- tion by medical inspectors ; and he urges persons who have the slightest premonitory symptoms during the epidemic period to have immediate re- course to medical advice.
During last week, according to the Board of Health reports, the deaths from cholera in Dundee were 28, in Liff and Benvie 3, in Glasgow 1. Since the first outbreak there have fallen 150 in Dundee, [to Wednesday last, 186,] 2 in Leith, 14 in Arbroath, 3 in Dalmeny, 4 in Liff and Ben- vie, 2 in Glasgow, and 5 in Edinburgh. The Cork Examiner states that the cholera has made its appearance in three dietricts of Cork city ; attacking, as usual, the filthiest localities and the most indigent classes. No details are given.
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