Proceedings and Reports of the Medical and Chirurgical Faculty of the State of Maryland

with whites. For example: the negro troops serving with white ones in the West Indies, where the former fell in large numbers from the disease from which the latter were comparatively exempt.

Mr. Parsons, who has brought over so many African boys to London to be educated, deplores the fact that "they all die of consumption."

The change of the African to the West Indies, where the range of the thermometer is quite as high as at home, could not account. for this high mortality without the presence of another factor, which is supplied by the humidity of the climate. Heat and moisture go hand-in-hand in this wholesale slaughter.

An interesting fact with regard to the power of climate is shown in the fact that the Europeans have persistently tried to live in the Valley of the Nile, but the emigrants have all died and left the country to its ancient inhabitants.

Romans and Visigoths lived in Africa for centuries by continually recruiting their ranks from Europe, and yet, except in the mountains, all traces of them have disappeared.

We think, however, that in the case of the negro, the superior knowledge of the present century will come to the rescue.

In support of the statement that heat and moisture are favoring conditions, Dr. Guilbert states that the large mortality on the coast of Peru and of the West Indies is directly due to this condition. In an elaborate report, prepared by Mr. Carter, our courteous and efficient Secretary to the Health Department, and to whom I am indebted for valuable assistance, he furnishes me facts, from which I perceive the following:

while in a period of diminished humidity, though of high temperature, we find

101°

Moisture.
66.

Col. Deaths from P.
18.09

White Deaths from P. 11.05

Prof. Quantrofangs, in Pop. Sci. Mo., No. 2,551, says: "That the negro is not affected by emanations from swamps and marshes, but is more liable to tuberculosis. Yet," he continues, "all immunities and predispositions disappear with time. He noticed

that in Barbadoes elephantiasis attacked only negroes till 1704, but since that time many white natives have become its victims, showing it to be a question of acclimation.

Under the heading, "Geography," Geography," Dr. Ancell says that nearly the whole of Africa is free from this disease; and as long ago as the time of Pliny, Egypt was exempt. He seldom saw it among the people of Abyssinia or Nubia, or along the West Coast, and in 124 deaths in this last locality, among British soldiers, not one was from tuberculosis. In St. Helena he found 3.2 in 1,000. In British Guinea, where nearly all the inhabitants are negroes, phthisis is unknown. In Mauritius, where there is a great variability of climate, many more men took the disease than in the British Isles, or on the Mediterranean. It is most fatal to negroes in Ceylon, where the climate is equable, but moist. Here the natives are but little affected, while the troops, all black, fall in large numbers. In Van Diemen's Land there is only one death from this disease in one hundred from all causes. In Lapland there is neither phthisis nor scrofula, but the Laplanders acquire both when they go to Denmark.

In the Madras army, sent into China, the deaths from phthisis became, in five years, five times as great as it had been in India. Finland youth, apprenticed in St. Petersburg, die in large numbers from this disease, though in this case other important elements no doubt contributed to the large mortality, prominent among which may be homesickness.

An interesting fact bearing upon this point of my subject is the exodus of negroes from the South to the West within the past few years. Animated by an idea of bettering their condition, their tone and vitality have been so preserved that, so far as I have observed, there has not been that great mortality among them that statistics show to exist in the large northern cities, although the climate in some of the new settlements has been found very severe. Louis, the Great Master, says: "All calculation in which the occupation, food, habits, etc., of the inhabitants are not duly considered may be regarded as negative." All the statistics bearing on the subject are interesting and instructive. Dr. Mossell, of Philadelphia, has published in The Alumni, a quarterly issued in that city, an article entitled, "Excessive Mortality of Negroes living in Northern Cities." He shows an extremely high mortality among negroes from all causes, but

particularly from phthisis. The four cities, Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore, all give larger death-rates from this disease among the colored than the other portion of the population, being in the case of the negro greater. He shows, by the following table, that in 1884 Boston, with a colored population of 6,000, gave a death-rate of 42.10 to the 1,000 colored deaths, while that among the whites was 24.12. sumption alone among the

Colored population was.....

The per cent. from con

And from pneumonia and bronchitis..................

While among the whites the per cent. from—

Consumption was...

Pneumonia and bronchitis........

... 22.22

13.79

16.12

12.89

A table for Philadelphia, covering a period of 23 years, from 1862-84, inclusive, shows an average

Another table, covering a period of 10 years, from 1875-84, inclusive, shows an average mortality from

Consumption among whites.....

66 colored.....

14.

18.

A table for New York, from 1867-84, shows average

Total mortality among whites.....

66 colored..........

26.78

30.72

This shows also that the average mortality among the colored people of New York from all causes is smaller than in Philadelphia. In another table for New York, from 1880-84, he found that the per cent. of deaths from zymotic diseases and consumption was as follows:

Thus sustaining an average of about one-third greater mortality among the colored than the white population-as in Boston and in Philadelphia.

Coming nearer home, I again quote our own Secretary of Board of Health. In his report for 1885 he presents a table, which covers a period of 10 years, from 1875-84, which I append in full:

Year.

MORTALITY IN BALTIMORE FROM ALL CAUSES, AND PER CENT. OF CONSUMPTION TO TOTAL MORTALITY.