312 The Mortality of Liverpool, | July, 
excuse; and on this subject we now desire, while there is still 
time for warning, to address a word to the nation, and, not to the 
Government, but to the Representatives of the people. 
In the House of Lords, on the 15th’ of May last, the Earl of 
Carnarvon “ moved for Copies of Correspondence,” in other words, 
sought information concerning the outbreak of cholera in Liverpool. 
He stated the fact, well known to their Lordships, that “a large 
number of German emigrants had landed at Hull, and had travelled 
by railway to Liverpool, and it was at Liverpool, without an excep- 
tion, that all these cases had arisen. The most formidable outbreak 
had occurred on board a vessel that had sailed from Liverpool to 
New York. It was at Liverpool again, and among this body of 
emigrants that diarrhoea and typhus had been prevalent, and the 
House was aware that diarrhoea was the first stage, and, at all 
events, the harbinger of cholera. The habits of these emigrants 
were the reverse of clean, and they were congregated together in 
the most unhealthy quarters of the town. A case had been stated 
where 150 of these emigrants lived in one house in Liverpool, and 
forty ina single room. If these persons really came from cholera- 
infected countries, were these not all the conditions that would 
justify them in expecting cholera to break out ?”* 
Earl Granville, who, be it remembered, was at least the nominal 
head of the Committee which managed the cattle-plague, stated 
what steps had been taken to prevent the importation of cholera ; 
observing that it would be impossible to enforce a system of qua- 
rantine in Great Britain, and remarking further, that a letter which 
had been issued by the Privy Council insisted upon sanitary regu- 
lations, “ which really might be summed up in the terms fresh air 
and fresh water, and some of the outports really stood in urgent 
need of sanitary measures.” 
In the House of Commons, the Right Honourable H. A. Bruce, 
the virtual head of the Cattle-plague Commissioners, gave the same 
information in reply to a similar question ; and in the course of his 
remarks he observed that, “we were accustomed to think of cholera 
as marked by clear and unmistakable symptoms, and the stage of 
collapse was no doubt one about which there could be no mistake, 
but the earlier stages of the malady were not so easily discoverable. 
A person might have the disease lurking in his system for many 
days without suspecting it. He suffered but little pain, and the 
symptoms were such as persons often experienced without any 
interruption of their ordinary vocations. It would, therefore, be 
impossible, unless communication were absolutely forbidden between 
England and the infected countries, to expect that quarantine laws 
would prevent the introduction of the disease.” 
* ¢ Times,’ May 15, 1866. + Ibid. 
