Page:Gazetteer of the province of Oudh ... (IA cu31924073057345).pdf/155

 КІНЕ 1 +7 Health.—The residents of the uparhár* appear robust and energetic, and no sickness prevails there. There is notbing in the soil to produce sickuess, and it is believed that the same soil extends up through the forest to the hills. Sickness will, no doubt, prevail for soune years till the underwood and all the putrid leaves be removed. The water that stag- nates over them, and percolates through the soil into the wells from which the people drink, the exhalations which arise from them tainting the air, and confined by the dense mass of the forest trees, the underwood, and high grass are the chief causes of the diseases which prevail in the jungles. It is, however, remarkable that there are two unhealthy seasons in the forest, one at the latter end of the rains in August, September, and October, and the other before the rains begin to fall in the latter part of April, the whole of May, and part of June. Those diseases which occur after the rains are caused by bad air, and those which occur immediately before the rains are created by bad water. Petroleum or liquid bitumen is found floating on the spring waters in the hot season, when the most fatal diseases burst out in the jungles; but whether the poisonous quality of the water be imparted to it by impure bitumen from below, or by the putrid leaves of the forest trees from above, is uncertain. The people drink from the spring waters at this season as well as from stagnant pools in the beds of small rivers which have ceased to flow during part of the cold and the whole of the hot season. These pools become filled with the leaves of the forest trees which overhang theia. The bitumen arises from the coal mensur es pressed down by the overlying masses of sandstone strata of the Himalaya chain of mountains beyond the Tarái forest. The putrid waters may possibly act both directly and through the medium of the air. The disease most common in this district is intermitteut fever, which appears to be endemic in the neighbourhood of Gokarannáth, and is caused by malaria produced apparently by the spontaneous decomposition of vegetable matter after the cessation of the monsoons, and by imperfect drainage. European and native constitutions suffer alike from its attacks. Spring fever appears mostly among those whose agrarian pursuits expose them to the noonday sun. It assumes a remittent type, and is propor- tionately more fatal as summer advances. Next in the order of frequency are bowel complaints. As a rule, they increase at harvest time, and have a fatal tendency when succulent fruit and vegetables become abundant in the market. Cholera became epidemic in this district during the rains of 1867, and was most fatal and persistent in those villages where filth most abounded. In Lakhímpur the scourge was apparently introduced on bazar days, or only occurred sporadically. Pulmonic and rheumatic affec- tions increase in winter. Of cutaneous affections herpes deserves notice; it is very prevalent among the natives. It seems to be acquired from the practice of keeping on a dhoti while bathing, and replacing it by a clean one without drying the skin. The disease is seen chiefly about the hips and loins of those affected, and does not yield readily to the treatment gene- rally adopted: strong acetic acid externally is the best remedy. Leprosy is not an uncommon disease. Goitre is most common among the trans-Chauka
 * Highlands.