HOW IMMIGRANTS ABE INSPECTED. 359 



ten to fifteen feet between the immigrants. The second doctor, placed 

 about thirty feet from the first, disregards that part of the examination 

 entrusted to his colleague and confines his examination to such defects 

 as are not looked for by the first doctor. The file of immigrants makes 

 a right-angle turn just as it reaches the second doctor and this enables 

 the examiner to observe the side and back of the passenger in the short- 

 est time possible. 



The examiners follow a routine in this examination, and the scru- 

 tiny begins at the approaching passenger's feet, before he comes within 

 fifteen feet of the examiner. The examiner's scrutiny beginning at the 

 feet travels upward, and the eyes are the last to be inspected. In this 

 way, lameness, deformity, defective eyesight (through efforts to adjust 

 his vision, after making the turn, to a new course) are detected. The 

 gait and general appearance suggest health or disease to the practised 

 eye, and aliens who do not appear normal are turned aside, with those 

 who are palpably defective, and more thoroughly examined later. 



The medical examiners must ever be on the alert for deception. 

 The nonchalant individual with an overcoat on his arm is probably 

 concealing an artificial arm; the child strapped to its mother's back, 

 and who appears old enough to walk alone, may be unable to walk be- 

 cause of infantile paralysis; a case of favus may be so skilfully pre- 

 pared for inspection that close scrutiny is required to detect the evi- 

 dences of recent cleansing, and a bad case of trachoma may show no 

 external evidence and be detected only upon everting the eyelid. 



After the last alien in line has passed the doctor, the suspected ones 

 turned aside are thoroughly examined, idiots and those suffering with 

 a loathsome or dangerous contagious disease are certified and sent to 

 the board of special inquiry. Cases not deemed fit to travel are sent 

 to the hospital, and cases with some disability likely to make them a 

 public charge are certified accordingly and also sent to the board of 

 special inquiry. Minor defects, such as anemia, loss of an eye, loss 

 of a finger, poor physique, low stature, etc., are recorded on the alien's 

 card and he is allowed to go to the registry clerk and immigrant in- 

 spector in charge of the manifest, who takes the defect into considera- 

 tion as contributory evidence, and may or may not send him to the 

 board. 



After passing the doctors, the immigrants are grouped, according 

 to the number of their manifest sheet, into lines of thirty or less. At 

 the head of each line is a registry clerk, or interpreter, and an immi- 

 gration inspector. The clerk, or interpreter, interrogates each alien, 

 and finds his name, and verifies the answers on the manifest sheet 

 before him, and if, in the opinion of the immigrant inspector, the im- 

 migrant is not clearly and beyond doubt entitled to land, he is held 

 for the consideration of the board of special inquiry. A board of spe- 



