Page:McCosh, John - Advice to Officers in India (1856).djvu/240

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ADVICE TO OFFICERS

halted at Boonga. We had not a case of cholera after leaving Luckipore. It is pretty well ascertained, though not easily accounted for, that if cholera break out in camp, and if that camp be broken up into parties, the chances are, that the greater number of parties will be exempt. This was strikingly exemplified in two companies of the 34th native infantry, that were detached: they had not a case of cholera after, though it continued with the head-quarters. The number of deaths on this occasion amounted to about seventy: about three-fourths of these were camp-followers. Most providentially, not a European officer was attacked: such is the caprice of this awful disorder.

The second time it was my fortune to meet with epidemic cholera, was in May and June, 1834, while in medical charge of the civil station of Goalpara, in Assam. Its progress up the Brahmapootra was very wed marked, but slow. I first heard of it at Dacca, some time after at Jumalpore, next it reached Goalpara, then it proceeded to Gohatti, thence to Bishnauth, and all in regular succession. Several weeks elapsed during its progress from Dacca to Bishnauth. In the town of Goalpara, with about 4,000 inhabitants, about 300 died of it. It continued to rage for six weeks. Its virulence seemed to have abated at Bishnauth, where only a few died.

The last time I saw cholera as an epidemic,