62 SINGAPORE RAINFALL. 
the corresponding fallings. For instance, the chart shows 
a sudden fall in the amount of rain for 1871 and 1872, with - 
a Slowly increasing rise up to 1875, followed by a still lower 
fall in 1877 (the lowest recorded). In 1878 there is almost 
double the rainfall of 1877, rising still higher in 1879, from 
which period down to 1883, the annual rainfall was steadily 
decreasing, but in 1884 it again ascended, and may ascend 
further if Mr. Skinner’s conclusions rest on a sound basis.* 
The continuous and steady improvements in the sani- 
tary condition of Singapore town and suburbs within the 
last eight years have been so marked, that it would hardly 
be fair to draw conclusive inferences from the old returns of 
health by comparing them with those of recent dates, and 
attributing any differences to the rainfall. For instanee, 
when cholera bioke out as an epidemic in 1873 (having been 
in the first instance imported from Bangkok where the 
disease was raging virulently) Singapore was suffering badly 
from want of water, the season was unusually dry, nearly all 
the wells such as they were—many being mere pits a few 
feet deep without any protective wall—had almcst run dry, 
the brick conduit for bringing the water from the impound- 
ing reservoir was a failure, as the water could not rise in the 
aqueduct over the canal, so that the poorer people resorted to 
the filthy canal water when the tide had ebbed. The largest 
number of cases of cholera occurred in the vicinity of that 
canal commencing from the Lunatic Asylum, which suffered 
severely, extending to Kampong Kapor, which was a regular 
hot-bed for developing, continuing and spreading the disease, 
and terminating at Rochor. There were also some cases of 
cholera from Kampong Malacea and tbe crowded parts of the 
* Tt is certainly weil to wait until we have a larger series of annusl returns 
before generalising on such a matter too positively ; and this branch of the sub- 
ject is only touched upon now to invite the attention of all who may keep or 
study our Meteorologic al Records. But from the evidence alre ady accumulated 
the long drought of 1882-83, which ended last August, was, I maintain, clearly 
to be anticipated ; for it closed the solar period dating from the limited rainfall 
(160 inches) in 1872-3, and the subsidiary dry period, showing the fall of 
148 inches only, in 1876-7. An excess of rain may, in the same way, be looked 
for in the years 1884-5, and still more in 1885-6 : but not so creat an excess, 
these years mcrely closing the subsidiary period of excess from 1!879-80 (228 
inches).—Journal No, 12 of the Str atts Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 
Pp. 204-0, 
