Page:Gazetteer of the province of Oudh ... (IA cu31924073057345).pdf/317

 LUC 309 is marked. In 1873 the largest number of deaths (960) occurred in November and the smallest (367) in July. The deaths registered from fevers during 1873 in the district were 7,233, giving a ratio of 9:30 per thousand of population. During the same year no less than 2,531 cases of fever were treated in the king's hospital, civil dispensary, and Balrámpur hos- pital, in the city of Lucknow. The most common kind is intermittent fever of the quotidian type in the proportion of 10 quotidian to 1 tertian. The quartan type is comparatively rare. Rcmittent fever is not uncom- mon. It exists in the district in the proportion of 1 to 50 of intermittent fever. Fevers in this district are comparatively speaking of a mild type. The causes are the same everywhere. Sub-soil drainage is a thing unknown in the district. Rank vegetation during the rains seems to be one of the chief causes. Unwholesome food is another. The poorer classes cannot afford to eat wheat, bájra or gram; during the greater part of the year kodo and makái of the worst kind are their common The numerous pools of stagnant water are the favourite seats of fever in the district. What with privation and exposure to the extremes of cold, and heat and rain, it is not to be wondered at, that fever is so prevalent in the district of Lucknow. Cholera is seldom absent from the district. There is no year in which a considerable number of deaths is not ascribed to this disease. Botlı forms of cholera (sporadic and epidemic) are met with. The discase appears at the setting in of the rains, and is generally prevalent during the months of July, August, September, October, and November. In 1873, the largest number of deaths (91) occurred in the month of November. The statistics of deaths from cholera during the last five years in this dis- trict are as follows; but as registration is very imperfect, these figures are only approximately correct. 831 deaths. 1869 1870 1871 1872 1973 99 19 P. 12 858 1,216 169 ta. 1) + >> 19 There does not seem to be any doubt now; that every year there is a focus of cholera in one of the districts, from which it is scattered about by pilgriins visiting the different fairs, shrines, and bathing places, or by traders travelling from one infected place to another. No class of people seem to be exempt from an attack of cholera. Especially, however, the lower classes of the people who are not particular about their food, and whose habits of life are far from cleanly, fall victims to this disease. In 1873, the ratio of deaths per thousand of population was 20. The causes of the disease are yet enveloped in mystery. Small-pox generally makes its appearance in the month of March, and attains its maximum intensity in the months of April, May, and Juve. It begins to decline during the rains, and almost disappears by the mid- dle of the cold weather. Small-pox rages with virulence in all ranks of society, and in absence of general vaccination or inoculation, numbers are carried off every year. Infection is the only cause of the disease, The people of this district seem to be averse to vaccination, and so long as 40