JAVA FEVER. OUTBREAK ON A STEAMER. TWO DEATHS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 418, 9 November 1889, Page 5

JAVA FEVER. OUTBREAK ON A STEAMER. TWO DEATHS.

The steamer Oatterthun, which arrived at Sydney last week from China, reached port with disease on board. Soon after she was berthed at the wharf one of the Chinese crew died of Java fever, and was carried on shore in a rough coffin. From inquiries made on board, it teems that the vessel called at Batavia and at Tanyonk Priok, where malarial fevers are said to abound almost always, and it is believed the crew of the Cabterthun were there attacked. Some years ago a steamer loading at this same place was similarly overtaken by the so-called "Java fever," and half of the crew died before the vessel got away. The place it seems is paitly an artificially made load-ing-ground, the vessels going into the river, so called, to take in their sugar cargoes. Some time ago the place was dredged out, and it is stated on pretty good authority that a death occurred for nearly every ton of soil raised. In the worst seasons, when the fever is raging at it-s worst, steam tenders laden with coffins have been seen in the harbour of Tanyong Priok. When the Catterthun was there she went into the river and loaded some cargo. A European passenger was taken on board, and he appears to have been the first to experience the symptoms of the epidemic. The first symptoms, it seems, are" terrible pains in the head of an intermittent kind, and followed by pains pretty much all over the body, with \omiting and great depression of spirits, high temperature, and shivering tits ; and if the sufferer is not naturally robust or hardy the fever completely prosttates him. The third officer of the Catterthun, Mr Cunningham, was in this condition when the steamer came up to the wharf, and he was carried on shore and placed in one of the ambulances, and taknn to the Prince Alfred Hospital. His case is a most serious one, indeed there were grave doubts whether he would reach this port alive. On the Saturday evening while the Catterthun was coming down the coast another of the ctow (a Chinaman) died and was buried at sea. The Chinese sailors on board suffered frightfully from the fever, as did also the firemen, who for the most part are African?, and it was stated that since leaving Batavia, or since the fever broke out, the working of the vessel had been carried out with no small measure of difficulty, both firemen and sailors being really unfit to fulfil their duties. The steamer is officered by Europeans, most of whom, if not all, aie very well known in Sydney, and it is related that they, with few exceptions, slightly suffered from some of the symptoms of this terrib'e malaria, which seems at one time to have threatened to prostrate the whole of the large number of men employed on board this vessel. Indeed, it is probable that it was only by the strong exercise of the will to resist the debilitating attacks of the complaint that they have come through the ordeal so well. The testimony on board is that a strong constitution requires to "fight against it," and only in this manner can the worst symptoms of the fever be arrested. It was on the Bth of last month that the Catterthun left Batavia. It will therefore readily be inferred that it took a strong hold of the ship's company when, after so long an interval, a number of strong men still remain physically unable to resume their ordinary avocation, and ?omeof their number have had to be removed to the hospital.

Teacher : Where do good little boys go when they die? Johnny: They go to heaven. Teacher : And where will I go? Johnny: I don't want to tell. Speaking at a banquet in an upcountry Hew South Wales district last week, Mr David Christie Murray said a three months' passage through the colonies had taught him at lea9t one thing. Without being an abnormally stupid or an exceptionally ignorant man, he had yet to confess that he had known absolutely nothing of the real curront of Australian thought before coming out here. He left behind him in the old home country thousands who were, if possible, more ignorant than himself. The mother-land rested in perfect easy satisfaction in the loyalty of the colonies to England, but what he personally desired to hear more of was the loyalty of England to her colonies. There was at home an ignorance and an indifference which argued ill if it were continued for the complete friendly association of Eng land with her dependencies. But after all there was this sterling comfort, of which the last words he had used in public before leaving England would best express his feelings — the mother-land and her colonies were bound together by no ties of red tape which might be broken in a moment by tho mere wave ot a free people's hand ; by no paper convention which might be shrivelled into nothing by the fierce heat of any passing controversy ; but they were tied together for ever and for ever and for ever by the bonds of a common origin, a common language, a common faith, and a universal hope.