and not an aid to well-doing and happiness. It is a protection, not from starvation, but from work.

When a man has once commenced a downward career a remittance will not stop or even delay it. The probability is that it will accelerate it.

With periodical aids to dissipation, the last stage of that man will be worse than the first.

There are, as it seems to me, two ways of helping him to climb the ladder of a new life.

Before I mention these I should wish to emphasise the warning that under no circumstances should the object of their concern be entrusted with a large sum of money on shipboard, or while making his way to his destination.

I have known a lad starting for the Cape with fifty pounds in his pocket land in South Africa with only a couple of sovereigns in his possession, and these the gift of a compassionate passenger. Gambling and extravagance had devoured the rest.

While living in Durban I received a communication from the wife of a retired Colonel, asking me to meet her stepson, who was coming out by one of the Union mail boats. He did not arrive, and it was afterwards discovered that having squandered his passage and other moneys, he was actually awaiting in England the return of his first quarter's allowance from Cape Town before commencing his journey.

The first plan is, that a youth be credited with a capital sum to be expended on his behalf by a reliable agent in some suitable business or occupation, with the definite understanding that he is henceforth to be the architect of his own fortunes, and that no other assistance will be given him.

An even better method is to let him fight his own way at first and touch the bottom, if need be, of destitution and despair. Then, when he shows signs of real amendment, or by his own efforts justifies aid, let some friend, some clergyman or consul who has been requested to keep an eye on him, come to his succour and promote his interests in the way that seems most fitting.

This plan to my own knowledge has been successful in several instances.

But, above all, he must not be allowed to think that he is forgotten or despaired of. Those who care for him must strive to maintain an unfailing interest and belief in him, assurances of which should be sent from time to time to the strayed member of the household.

A young German in Adelaide, whose great horticultural and botanical acquirements were freely used in the adornment of the city gardens and streets, committed suicide, and left in writing as his reason, that his relatives had given him up, and that he never heard

from them. Yet during his stay in South Australia he had gained almost complete mastery over a habit of taking drugs, and a helpful word from those he loved might have completed his reformation and saved his life.

It is possible, however, to be a very regular and a very irritating correspondent.

A clerk in a bank abroad said to me, with a strong note of resentment in his voice, that his sister never wrote to him without reminding him of the past. If it is true that the scapegrace forgets his evil deeds so quickly that he is both surprised and hurt when anyone else recalls them, it is also true that it is wiser and more inspiring to show him the possibilities of the future rather than the failures of the days gone by.

Therefore, let the letters he receives serve to keep him in touch with self-respect and with the memory of better days. Let them contain kindly remembrances, encouraging words, affectionate counsels, but not remittances. Let them convey to him newspaper cuttings, photographs, household details, and the account of things small in themselves, but which make up among them the image of 'the marvellous thing which we call "home," the most powerful loadstone for drawing the wanderer's heart from the ends of the earth.

D. WALLACE DUTHIE

(David Garth).

1899

THE PLAGUE IN OPORTO1

FOR several months Plague, or Pest as it is called it is called on the Continent, has been present on a small but continually increasing scale in the town of Oporto; but up to the time of writing, it has not appeared, so far as can be ascertained, in any other part of Western Europe. With the exception of a few cases which occurred during September in a village about twelve miles from Oporto, it has been entirely confined to the town itself, and has not even crossed the river Douro. This isolated outbreak has attracted an amount of attention quite out of proportion to its extent for reasons which can be easily understood. In the first place it represents the reappearance, after a very long absence from European soil, of what was once the most destructive of all epidemic disorders. The last really great outbreak in this part of the world occurred at Marseilles and in Provence in the year 1720. I have a very interesting old print of the Cours de Marseille, which professes to be from a drawing made on the spot during the plague. It shows the people lying about dead and dying in the streets, and corpses being lowered from the windows. There was another violent outbreak in Moscow in 1770; but during the early part of the present century the disease was confined to the Levant, where it shrank and dwindled until it finally disappeared from the northern shore of the Mediterranean in 1841. Since then, with the exception of a small but distinct outbreak on the Lower Volga in the winter of 1878-79, Europe has been entirely free from plague. England and the West generally, including the Peninsula, have seen nothing of it for over 200 years.

Its revival, therefore, at the present time is a very remarkable fact. That is the first point to be noted. The second is that this revival constitutes a farther step in the march westward which has been going steadily on during the last six years. In the south of China plague has apparently been endemic for years. Perhaps it is always endemic there. In 1894 it appeared in Canton and Hong

For many of the facts contained in this article I am indebted to Dr. Ricardo Jorge, medical officer of health to the municipality of Oporto. I am glad to have this opportunity of paying a sincere tribute of admiration to the ability, zeal, and courage with which he has discharged the duties of a most difficult and thankless position.

Kong in a violent form, killing about 100,000 persons in the former and 2,550 in the latter. In 1896 a recrudescence took place, and in the same year it appeared in Bombay, having presumably been carried there by sea, though the introduction was never traced. Since 1896 neither China nor India has been free, while a gradual extension westwards has taken place; to Persia and to Astrachan; to Mauritius, East Africa, and Egypt; finally to Portugal. No, not finally; for some apparently trustworthy accounts of plague in Uruguay and Brazil have recently come to hand. The whole story recalls that of the Black Death-the great pandemic visitation of the fourteenth century—which also came out of China and travelled slowly westward. The present wave is clearly of a pandemic character, and Oporto shows that Europe is not impregnable to attack, as we had rather begun to assume.

These considerations will explain the interest taken in the occurrence. A great deal has been learnt about plague in the East of late years, though a great deal more remains obscure. In modern Europe, however, it is still an unknown quantity, and in view of the serious consequences involved in the spread of such a formidable sickness, its behaviour cannot be too carefully watched and studied. In India we have seen that the most energetic and enlightened measures dictated by modern knowledge have failed to extirpate the infection, which has shown itself capable of acting with all the virulence that gave it so sinister a reputation in the past. How will it behave in Europe? What are the conditions under which it has obtained a footing, and how is it behaving under those conditions? What are the measures taken to combat its progress, and how far are they successful?

Having had an opportunity of studying these questions on the spot, I beg to offer the result of my observations as a small contribution to the subject.

On the face of it the selection of Portugal for attack in preference to other parts of Europe very much nearer the infected East is a somewhat striking fact, which suggests the question whether that country was formerly in any special degree a favourite seat of plague. I cannot find any evidence that it was. In common with the rest of Europe, it was ravaged by the Black Death in the fourteenth century, and by several epidemic visitations in the fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries. A royal order, which still remains on the Statute Book, was issued in September 1506, containing special regulations against plague in Lisbon. This seems to have been the first attempt to deal with public health as a function of the Government. The last reference to plague previous to the present year is an order dated 1680. Portugal has in fact been free for more than 200 years, and the visitations of the preceding centuries were no more frequent or more severe than those recorded in other countries,

including England. Nor within the boundaries of Portugal itself did the town of Oporto suffer in any special degree-not more than Lisbon, for instance. History, therefore, furnishes no explanation of its selection on the present occasion.

Still less can the invidious distinction be explained by any circumstances connected with the trade of the port; for Oporto, as I have satisfied myself by an examination of the shipping register, has no direct communication with any port known to be infected. This is a very important point, to which I shall refer again when I come to discuss the origin of the outbreak. The fact is only noted here to clear the ground. Neither the past records nor the present external relations of the town throw any positive light upon the subject. I pass on to consider the place itself.

Oporto lies on the river Douro, only two or three miles from its mouth. This remarkable river runs between hills throughout the whole of its course, which may be likened to one prolonged Highland glen, extending for 100 miles or more. In the upper partthe Alto Douro of vintage fame-the hills are formed of the celebrated 'golden schist,' which grows the port wine grapes; in the lower part the formation is granite. Just where Oporto lies the rocks come together, forming a deep gorge, below which the river expands into a pool, in which the shipping lies. At this point the precipitous banks fall back somewhat and open out into a less abrupt but still steep declivity. It is here, on the side of the hill, nestling under and climbing up the rocks from the water's edge, that the oldest part of the town is situated. From this nucleus it has expanded over the hills as they recede from the river, and now straggles away irregularly in such a fashion that the outskirts melt insensibly into the surrounding villages. It is impossible to say exactly where the eity begins or ends. The river opposite the town is roughly from 150 to 300 yards wide, and spanned in the narrower part by a bridge, which carries a high level and a low level roadway, the former some 150 feet above the latter. This will give some idea of the steepness of the river banks. The situation is more like that of Newcastle than any other town that I know in England. Oporto proper lies on the north bank, but the south is also built over, and the two form virtually one place. The south bank is called Villa Nova de Gaya, and resembles the other in the lie of the ground, but not otherwise. The houses are built in a much more detached fashion, and a large portion of the ground is occupied by the wine lodges, as the cellars are called. Consequently the density of the population is far less. Many of the workpeople employed in Oporto live in Villa Nova. It is a striking fact that in spite of the large intercourse no case of plague has yet occurred in Villa Nova.

I trust that this description will make the situation of the town, which is a very important point, sufficiently clear. Briefly, the