SANITARY NOTES. KHARTOUM 
f)l 
In 1B70 ' he found the population had fallen to about 15,000, Init otherwise the town 
remained unchanged. In October he speaks of it as a hateful spot. “ Notliing,” he says, “can 
exceed its misery at this season.’’ lie again alludes to the absence of drainage, the presence 
of mud, the dense population, probably in reference to crowded dwellings, for it had diminished 
one half, and above all to the “exaggerated stench.’’ “These,” he remarks, “have vamjuished 
the European settlers.” “ No wonder! ” we are inclined to say, and pause a moment to 
comment on the evil effects of the overcrowding. 
Jennings- has recently written of the terribly insanitary conditions of the towns in 
Abyssinia at the present day, where “ the inhabitants could not survive at all but for the 
merciful dealings of a tropical sunlight, which can well-nigh convert the smell of a pole-cat 
into the aroma of a nosegay.” 
Now the same, or even a mightier sun, is and was operative at Khartoum, and there can 
he no doubt that it was in some measure the overcrowding which led to such dire effects 
resulting from insanitary surroundings. Moreover, one must distinguish between sun plus 
dryness, and sun plus moisture, as will be seen when we come to deal with prevailing 
conditions. 
Our next and last author is Pelkin,'^ a medical man who was at old Khartoum in 1880, 
and remarks : “ I noticed a great difference in Khartoum since my first visit eighteen months 
previously. The sanitary arrangements were in much better condition, but it is a great 
mistake that the town is built on its present site. As it lies on low ground at the junction 
of the Blue and White Niles, in the Kharif a great part is inundated ; on the other side of 
the Blue Nile there is much higher ground, and the town if placed there would naturally 
have been more salnbrious. In spite of these disadvantages it is rapidly improving, the 
grand Government buildings were nearly finished, many good houses and a large hospital 
are being built, while shops of a better class are already opened.” 
So much tor the past, and the city wliich was swept out of existence by the Mahdi 
and the Khalifa. 
Let us very briefly consider the sanitary jirohlems presented by that new Khartoum 
which has arisen on the ruins of its predecessor, and has sjiread to that northern hank of 
the Blue Nile which Felkin quite correctly lielieved to be a belter site for the capital. 
Khartoum is situated on latitude 15° 29' North and is 1255 feet aliove the level of the 
Mediterranean, the figure tor Khartoum North being 12(59 feet. 
Site. The main town, on the southern hank of the Blue Nile, is placed, according to 
Ward, in a fine high and healthy situation, hut in reality on a bed of alluvium, part of which 
is below Nile level at full flood, and the hanks of which are exposed to the scouring action of 
the river, which annually eats into them and carries masses of soil down stream. As a result 
this southern bank has had to he protected by a huge wall of masonry. If the Blue Nile were 
ever to reach its highest known level it would surmount its southern bank, and in the absence 
of preventive measures would flood the central part of the town, which lies in a hollow. To 
the south of this depression the ground rises very considerably, and spreads away to the hare 
treeless and wind-swept desert, which, while contributing to the healthiness of the city, 
furnishes the sand that in the haboub season swee))s upon the town and envelops it in a 
black or yellow mantle of acute discomfort. 
On the northern side of the Blue Nile the banks are bold and high, and here Khartoum 
North has been placed, with its railway station, stores, barracks, and large native settlement. 
Sir Samuel 
Baker’s second 
visit. 1870 
Felkin's visit, 
1880 
Site 
Khartoum 
North 
' Baker, Sir S. W. (1874), “ Ismailia.” 
“ Jennings, Captain (1900), “With the Abyssinians in Somaliland.” Journal of Tropical Medicine, p. 02. 
=* Wilson, C. T., and Felkin, K. W. (18H0), “ Uganda and the Egyptian Sudan.” 
* Ward,(1905), “ Our Sudan ; its I’yramids and Progress.” 
