578 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



lation should seek safety in flight. It is believed that fully 300,000 

 people left Bombay shortly after the plague developed. There can 

 be no doubt but that these refugees, directly or indirectly, carried the 

 disease to the neighboring villages, and thus contributed to the enor- 

 mous dissemination of the pest throughout Western India. In the 

 Presidency of Bombay there were reported, in less than three years, 

 more than 220,000 cases, with more than 164,000 deaths. When it is 

 furthermore recognized that the natives concealed the existence of the 

 disease as much as possible, it will be evident that these figures reveal a 

 partial but, nevertheless, a grim truth. 



With Bombay and the surrounding country thus seriously infected, 

 it became merely a question of time when the disease would be carried to 

 other ports and countries, by vessels and by overland routes. In spite 

 of the sanitary perfection which we may flatter ourselves on having 

 attained in recent years, it is nevertheless a fact that the disease is 

 slowly but steadily and, as it were, stealthily invading port after port. 

 That the sanitary methods, however, are not at fault is seen in the 

 fact that when an early and prompt recognition occurred, the disease 

 has been held in check. The insidious spread of the disease is rather 

 due to the enormous development of commerce and to the rapid means 

 of communication with distant countries. 



From Bombay the plague has spread to ports on the Persian Gulf, 

 on the Ked Sea, and has reached Alexandria. Aden, Djeddah, Port 

 Said, Cairo, have all had outbreaks of the disease. Beirut and Smyrna 

 have each developed straggling cases. Isolated cases have been met 

 with in London, at St. Petersburg and in Vienna. However, only 

 three appreciable outbreaks have as yet occurred on European soil. 

 The first was that at Oporto in Portugal, where one hundred and sixty 

 cases, with fifty-five deaths, have developed up to the present time. 

 The second outbreak occurred at Kolobovka, a village near Astrakhan. 

 Of the twenty-four cases that developed there in July and August, 

 1899, twenty-three died. The last outbreak is that at Glasgow, where 

 the disease made its appearance but a few weeks ago. 



In addition to following the great international highway of Suez, 

 the disease has insidiously spread to the countries of East Africa. 

 Mauritius and Madagascar, with the adjoining mainland of Mozam- 

 bique and Lorenzo Marquez, have become more or less infected, and, 

 if reports are to be credited, it has also appeared in one of the Boer 

 towns and also on the Ivory Coast in Western Africa. Last fall the 

 disease reached South America. It apparently was first recognized 

 at Santos, in Brazil, during October, although early in September, ac- 

 cording to reports, a peculiar disease, causing swelling of the glands 

 and death within forty-eight hours, was reported at Asungion, the 

 capital of Paraguay. At the present time Eio Janeiro is infected. 



