FEVER, YELLOW. 



Ml 



the gardens and public squares every blade of 

 grass and the broad banana-leaves were cased 

 in i< (.-, which glittered but did not melt under 

 a brilliant sun. It is conceded that fever 

 (!<>, s not spread with the temperature below 

 60, and it has been the prevalent belief that a 

 cold lower than 32 is destructive of the poison. 

 Houses were thrown open to freely admit this 

 beneficent natural disinfectant. But reliance 

 on refrigeration did not supersede other at- 

 tempts at sanitation, the lessons of the previ- 

 ous year being too vivid. The city authorities, 

 and the local and the national Boards of Health, 

 were ably seconded by a volunteer organiza- 

 tion, the New Orleans Auxiliary Sanitary As- 

 sociation. They collected their own funds by 

 private subscription, cooperated with the muni- 

 cipal authorities, and did much work that the 

 city and Board of Health could not perform. 

 They established a systematic house-to-house 

 inspection. Not satisfied with suggesting dis- 

 infection, they undertook it, and it was done 

 efficiently and continually. Pumps, one of 

 which cost $9,000, were presented by the Presi- 

 dent of this Association and a public-spirited 

 firm of merchants. With their aid the gutters 

 were constantly flowing with fresh water. 

 The potter's-field, a crying evil, was covered 

 with a deep layer of earth, and a new one was 

 opened. Boused by their appeals, public opin- 

 ion enforced many reforms. The Common 

 Council undertook the work of filling, not with 

 garbage but with pure river-sand, the u fever- 

 holes" which for over twenty-five years have 

 disfigured the Levee, extending for a mile 

 along the river-front. The magnitude of the 

 work accomplished may be better estimated 

 when it is said that they average six feet in 

 depth. The area to be filled was 644,000 

 square feet, or about fifteen acres, and required 

 129,000 cubic yards of sand. Much is due to 

 these energetic and patriotic exertions. The 

 exemption from epidemic is doubtless the re- 

 sult of a combination of causes. The weather 

 throughout the summer was unusually and 

 sometimes unseasonably cool. The tables on 

 page 363 show the relative temperature, barom- 

 eter, and rainfall of the two seasons. The 

 languor and oppression under which sick and 

 well suffered during 1878 belong evidently 

 to atmospheric conditions not yet tabulated. 

 It is to be regretted, in the interests of science, 

 that the Signal Service does not in New Orleans 

 test the degree of electricity. The alkalinity 

 of the air should also be registered. 



In the teeth of much heated opposition, a 

 strong quarantine was maintained by the local 

 Board of Health. Notwithstanding this, the 

 first case of this season entered the city on the 

 27th of March. The steamship Baltimore, 

 from Rio Janeiro, reached quarantine on March 

 25th. After due fumigation and ventilation, 

 and two days 1 detention, she was allowed to 

 proceed. The coxswain was taken down with 

 fever on the evening of the 26th. Removed 

 to the Touro Infirmary, he passed through the 



disease to recovery. No infection spread from 

 this patient. The next cases occurred eleven 

 weeks later, in a house on Third Street, be- 

 tween Constance and Camp. Constance Street 

 has been for years the spot where the fever 

 comes earliest and lingers latest. Through 

 this section once ran a sluggish bayon, long 

 since tilled up. Possibly its marshy surround- 

 ings, or its action as a natural drain to the 

 neighborhood, may cause its unhealthinesa. 

 There had been several cases and one death in 

 this Third Street house during 1878. It was 

 rented by an unacclimated family, who had 

 never spent a summer in New Orleans. It 

 bad been thoroughly renovated and cleansed, 

 except the vault, which had not been emptied 

 for more than a year. This was done on June 

 8th. On the 16th one of the children showed 

 fever symptoms. On the 17th the second 

 child was taken. The third was attacked on 

 the 22d, and the fourth on the 27th. On the 

 12th of July the uncle of these children caught 

 the disease. On the 14th the last child was 

 fever-stricken. On the 17th the father, pilot 

 on board a river-steamer, was prostrated by 

 the disease when the boat was twenty miles 

 below Vicksburg. Of these seven cases all 

 recovered. The symptoms were not so marked 

 as to convince the attending physician, a man 

 of experience and integrity, that they were 

 yellow fever, and they were therefore not re- 

 ported. A servant employed in this house- 

 hold, after nursing the sick children, went to 

 Mississippi City to visit her family, who reside 

 near this seashore resort, situated a short dis- 

 tance from New Orleans on the Gulf coast. 

 Apparently well when she left New Orleans, 

 on the 6th of July she was seized, before she 

 reached her home on the evening of that same 

 day. On the 10th she died. The fever was 

 communicated to her family. On the 18th 

 two were taken, on the 19th two more, and 

 on the 20th the last brother was attacked. 

 Of these six cases, two died. Some two hun- 

 dred yards distant from them was the resi- 

 dence of a gentleman whose son was taken ill 

 on July 25th. It is believed that this child 

 played with his little neighbors, and thus con- 

 tracted the disease. Much difference of opin- 

 ion prevailed among the physicians who ex- 

 amined these cases. Some classed them as 

 bilious, some as malarial haemorrhagic fever. 

 The question was practically settled when an 

 Italian girl dwelling at the corner of Constance 

 and Second Streets, within a short distance of 

 the house where the seven doubtful cases had 

 previously appeared, died of undoubted yellow 

 fever on July 27th. A washerwoman living 

 in the next yard carried home the clothing of 

 a family in Washington Street, who received 

 the infection. They perceived an odor of car- 

 bolic acid, and discovered too late that it was 

 due to disinfectants lavishly used on the ad- 

 joining premises. 



Within two squares of the first infected 

 house was the mansion of General Hood. Af- 



