740 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION H. 



often quiet water of the cove, might be deposited on or in the 

 feeding- oyster, to be distributed and eaten. Here at least 

 seemed such a complete chain of possible cause and effect 

 that steps were at once taken to have the oysters removed and 

 stored in the river away from the chances of infection from 

 the town drains. 



Other Channels, 



But it is not only by means of food and water that the 

 typhoid poison finds an entrance to the human organism. 

 In investigating the surroundings of each case it frequently 

 happens that the patient can distinctly trace the first onset of 

 the disease to having inhaled an unpleasant odour from some 

 street, gully, or drain, or pan. Here it is the air, not the 

 food or water, which is the vehicle of the poison. Tn many 

 towns with ill-ventilated sewers typhoid has been clearly traced 

 to the sewer gas getting into the houses, or to emanations of 

 foul air from a sewage-laden soil. And in endeavouring to 

 explain the cause of typhoid in Hobart year after year, I am 

 reminded of the past sanitary history of Hobart ; that for 

 half a century the surface of the ground in Hobart has been, 

 so to speak, pitted with badly constructed cesspits ; that until 

 the establishment of our present system — that is, imtil four 

 or five years ago — the soil and subsoil of the town from one 

 end to the other was being daily polluted by leaking cesspits ; 

 that these cesspits, even on the establishment of the present 

 system, were never adequately emptied and purified, and 

 frequently, for years previously, were never emptied at all, 

 rain-water and drain-water reaching them in many places. 

 What was removed from one place in the town was often 

 buried in another ; land which required raising was filled in 

 with the contents of ashpits, with decomposing garbage and 

 refuse ; so that, in my opinion, the subsoil of Hobart is 

 fouled with half a century's drain and cesspit and other pollu- 

 tions, which drain pollution is still going on in many places, 

 though I am thankful to say that cesspits have for some 

 years been discontinued, btill the old pollution remains ; 

 great as is the purifying influence of the soil the task has 

 been too great ; and as this soil pollution travels under- 

 ground, borne along by rain and drain waters, its emanations 

 permeate the porous upper soil and are drawn into the houses 

 to poison with typhoid those who are susceptible to the 

 disease. Hirsch, speaking of the part played by the soil in 

 the development or diffusion of the typhoid poison, says : — 

 " In all probabihty the soil serves as a breeding-place for the 



