154 Voyage of the Novara. 



passage from the ship to the hospital. Any vessel at anchor in 

 the bay with an epidemic on board, has, according to arrange- 

 ment, simply to hoist a flag on the mainmast, whereupon the 

 Government steamer immediately embarks the sick persons. 

 In order more effectually to keep from all contact with the 

 population of the town, such shipboard patients as are labour- 

 ing under infectious complaints, another hospital has been 

 established on the Island of Marica, situated beyond the bar. 



In consequence of these recent epidemic attacks, much 

 greater attention than formerly has of late been paid to the 

 cleanliness of the capital of the Brazilian empire, though a 

 great deal has yet to be done in this respect. Rio used to be, 

 without exception, the dirtiest city in the world. As there were 

 neither gutters nor sewers, all impurities accumulated during 

 the twenty-four hours used, towards evening, to be carried by 

 negroes on their heads, in pails and casks, to the bay, and, 

 singularly enough, emptied in the immediate vicinity of the 

 Imperial palace, whereby several quarters of the city, parti- 

 cularly in the hot season, were rendered entirely uninhabitable. 

 The execution of proper drainage and sewerage works in a 

 city such as Rio, which lies on a flat and is densely built near 

 the water, must be at all times attended with a very large 

 expenditure of money. But who would boggle at any amount 

 for an object which concerns the bodily health, not merely of 

 the present, but of all succeeding generations ? At the period 

 of our visit, the Government had entered into a contract with 

 Messrs. Joaquim Pereira de Lima and J. F. Russell, by 



