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for the services of an Assistant Medical Officer of Health ashore, for although it is true that there are many Sanitary District in England of equal area and with a much larger population, that have but one Medical Officer of Health, yet there can be no comparison between the habits and customs of even the lowest class of the British workman and those of the Chinese coolie.
It is true that I have hitherto made no application either to the Sanitary Board or to the Government for an Assistant, but that is solely because I have felt that an increase in the staff of Sanitary Inspectors was a matter of far greater urgency than the appointment of an Assistant Medical Officer of Health, and this much needed addition was only obtained in the spring of this year.
B. Insufficiency of Sanitary Inspectors. I am of the opinion that, for the present, the staff of Sanitary Inspectors is sufficient for the needs of the population during non-epidemic times. Four privates have recently been lent by the Military Authorities for special Plague duty, owing to the existing epidemic and to the fact that two of the Inspectors are sick (one with Plague) and a third on home leave, but such a contingency may