20 THE HEALTH OF HOBART. 



repfarded as a fully trustwortliy test of its liealtlifiilness. All 

 the i'vver oases in Ho])art Avere not notified, and the speaker 

 p^ave statistics to support liis contention. As Mr. Johnston 

 had indicated, without accurate statistics they couhl not know, 

 prove, or compare anything. As a soldier he could not ufFord 

 to "enthuse" over statistics the bases of which were, to say 

 the least, of uncertain origin. (Applause.) 



Mr. W. F. Ward (Government Analyst) considered that 

 Mr. Johnston's paper could not fail to convince anyone who 

 Avould take the trouble to read it carefully, that excluding the 

 deaths of old people, which formed such a large proportion of 

 the deaths, and the old must die, Hobart death-rate was lower 

 than that of other Australasian cities. But even this was not 

 sufficient to attract the attention of visitors, and so he sug- 

 gested that the monthly statements might either be so modified 

 as to emphasise every time the high rate from old age alone 

 occurred, or that the vital statistics be published at longer 

 intervals, with full details. The question, however, was not, 

 he thought, so much one of figures as of the general health 

 reputation of the place, and in this we had suffered somewhat, 

 owing, iu the first place, to a few conspicuous cases of diph- 

 theria last summer, and in the second, to perhaps a greater 

 degree, to a statement repeated again and again that the town 

 smelt to quite an unusual extent ; that bad odours were, in 

 fact, "frequent and painful and free," the cause being the want 

 of rain to wash the town. Now, the ordinary passer-by did 

 not stop to investigate, but classed everything which offended 

 his 01' her nostrils comprehensively as '* drains," declaimed 

 a(;cordingly, and anticipated germs, although it might be no 

 more than the powerful but harmless water in which a cabbage 

 had been boiled. (Laughter and applause.) Yet the good 

 name of the city suffered. (Hear, hear.) There was no 

 necessary connection between bad smells and infectious diseases. 

 Human beings could often, for long periods, eat, drink, and 

 breathe more or less filth, and be apparently not much the 

 worse until the specific germs are somehow introduced wdiich 

 then increase, multiply, and spead in the congenial soil, so that 

 typhoid and diphtheria were known as "filth diseases." It 

 followed, therefore, that though offensive odours might in some 

 cases be practically harmless, yet there was no reason wdiy 

 they should be tolerated if they could by any possibility be got 

 rid of, and if enthusiasts had occasionally exaggerated their 

 effects as well as the death-rate, yet enthusiasm carried most 

 reforms, and had in this case great, if not full, justification. 

 (Applause.) 



