BLACKWOOD'S EDINBURGH MAGAZINE
| No. DCCCLXXXXVII. | SEPT. 1889. |
Vol. CXLVI. |
LEPERS AT THE CAPE: WANTED, A FATHER DAMIEN.
[But for the unquestionable reliability of the writer of this article, we could not have believed that so inhuman and disgraceful a state of things could have been permitted to exist in any British colony; and we commend the case to those philanthropists at home who have lately been showing so benevolent an interest in the question of leprosy.—Ed. B. M.]
One of the practical results of
the self-sacrifice of Father Damien
has been to attract additional attention to one of the most dreadful physical woes to which human
nature is liable—leprosy. Close
to Cape Town there is a second
Molokai, called Robben Island,
perhaps even a saddler place because it is unrelieved by the interest and intense public sympathy
aroused by the Sandwich isle.
Here the patients live a death—to coin an expression—comparatively uncared for, and certainly
unwept; and here, too, are gathered together a number of lunatics
with a proportion of convicts.
A dirty little tug occupies three-quarters of an hour in our rough unpleasant transit. It conveys about forty passengers, most of whom are officials connected with the island; while a few, like myself, have obtained a special Government permit, without which no outsider is allowed to disembark. Our freight comprises twenty sheep cruelly tied up by the legs and as cruelly piled on each other, some bundles of forage, and a medley of articles, such as soap for the lepers, letters for the lunatics, and coffee for the convicts. The surpassingly lovely view of Table Mountain fades from our gaze, and we turn to behold suddenly the island of desolation about three miles in diameter, low and flat, sad and sandy, with scarcely a vestige of vegetation, save patches of coarse, unlovely grass. The
