THE EPIDEMIC OF 1781-83.
9
out the district of Ganjam in Marcli and April, 1781, of its travelling northward to Calcutta, attacking tlie inhabitants of that city and the intervening country, and passing on in the same northerly direction. Here, unfortunately, a blank occurs in the history of its progress; but we ' find that/n April, 1783, cholera burst out at Hurdwar, and in less than eight days is supposed to have cut off 20,000 pilgrims. *
This is precisely the course, and about the same time which subsequent waves of cholera have taken when passing over India ; and it seems to me that this fragmentary history is presumptive evidence that the epidemic was of a similar nature to that which occurred in 1817, and on subsequent occasions. This position is strengthened by the fact that Dr. Girdlestone says :* — " Spasms was the first disease which appeared among the troops who arriveS. at Madras in October, 1782. More than fifty of these fresh men were killed by them within the first three days after they landed in that country, and in less than a month's time upwards of a thousand had suffered from attacks of these . complaints." He goes on to 'describe the disease thus : — There is " coldness of the surface of the body, especially of the hands, feebleness of the pulse, spasmodic contraction of the lower extremities, the hands and feet become sodden with cold sweats, nails livid, pulse more feeble, breath cold, thirst insatiable, vomitmg incessant, which last, if not checked, soon terminates the existence of the patient." This is evidently an account of the disease we recognise as epidemic cholera.
Fra Paolino da S. Bartolomeo also, in a work
- Essays ' On the Hepatitis and Spasmodic AiFections in India.' By
J. Girdlestone, M.D. London, 1787.
