of all undergrowth. Carbolic acid was freely used to disinfect drains. The sudden and startling death of a number of prominent members of the foreign community, gave to the year 1870 the aspect of a specially unhealthy year. It was pointed out that in the early part of summer and up to 3rd August, 1870, there was an unusually small rainfall, and an unusual increase of fever, accompanied by a tendency to relapse which caused great prostration and in some cases assumed the character of typhus. Most practitioners attributed the cause to earth cutting on the hill sides. Dr. J. T. Murray, however, persisted in tracing the disease to the paucity of rain but he also complained that the drains of the town remained what they ever had been (in the absence of rain), the source of disease, and urged that they be run out into deep water and frequently flushed. An epidemic of smallpox having broken out in December 1870, and the temporary matsheds erected near the Civil Hospital being overcrowded (January, 1871), the deserted Gaol-buildings on Stonecutters' Island were converted into a smallpox hospital which answered all expectations. Among 101 cases treated (73 civilians and 28 soldiers), there were only 9 deaths.
The subject of contagious disease engaged Sir Richard's attention soon after his arrival. He found fault with the C.D. Ordinance of 1858, as its penal provisions were directed exclusively against indoor prostitution, also against the keepers of illicit establishments only and not against the inmates. Believing that the existing system failed to check disease, Sir Richard forthwith inaugurated a more vigorous policy. A new Ordinance, passed on 23rd July, 1867, subjected accordingly both the keepers and the inmates of unlicensed houses to fine and imprisonment, prohibited solicitation in the streets, extended the application of medical examination and detention in the Lock Hospital, gave the Police power to break into suspected houses without a warrant, and conferred upon the Registrar General judicial as well as executive powers, in order to remove prosecutions under the Ordinance from the publicity of the
