L2
20 125 fu. 340 (2)
this effect was received weeks before their arrival at this Port; nor was it due to the charge which Dr. Swan brings against the Captain of the "Plassy", which I am of course unable to investigate at the moment, for if Dr. Swan was on board when the Captain refused to deliver the mails, as he alleges, why should the Government notify me that the Post Office Officials should be allowed "to disembark with the Mails before the Health Officer visits the ship", to use their own words. The arrangement was made simply because the Government realised, what was indeed apparent to all, that with a private practitioner as Health Officer, delays were liable to occur in the Medical inspection of the Mail Steamers. Allusion was made to the fact that the Post Office Officials were allowed to land before the arrival of the Health Officer with the sole object of giving force to the arguments, used later on in my letter, for extending the powers of Captains of vessels carrying qualified surgeons.
Para: 2. I commend this para: to the special attention of the Committee. I submit that a stronger case could hardly be made for the revision of the present system of the Medical inspection of this important shipping centre and for the improvement of signalling vessels arriving with contagious or infectious disease on board, advocated in my letter, than Dr. Swan's own statements, he writes:- "On the morning of this steamer's arrival, I was attending to my duties in other parts of the Harbour from 7.15 a.m. and it was only when I reached the West End on my morning rounds that I discovered the S.S. "Coromandel" was in quarantine." (According to Capt. Vibert's report, attached, the "Coromandel", flying the Yellow Flag, anchored in the quarantine anchorage at 7.18 a.m.). Surely ...