1842.
Report of the Medical Missionary Society.
663
ledge of the Chinese in different parts of their extensive territory enlarges, we shall find that in common with other eastern nations, they are peculiarly exempt from those acute inflammatory diseases of the viscera, which annually destroy such multitudes of our country- men. They are also less liable to the effects and consequences of accidents and intemperance, and with the exception of the dreadful scourges of famine, small-pox, and cholera, with which they are occasionally visited, and the increasing evils of opium-smoking, I should say that there appears to be a fair proportion of health in China.
Diseases of the skin, leprosy, &c. Psoriasis annulata, lichen circi- natus, and scabies purulenta, are of daily occurrence, and happily they are easily cured by the topical remedies in common use, espe- cially sulphur and blue ointment; these are invaluable, but the Chinese do not possess them, and are ignorant of their use as external applications. The most formidable cutaneous disease among the inhabitants in the south, is the leprosy; which is regarded with horror as an incurable and contagious disease. In Canton, there is a lazar house supported by the government, and capable of holding several hundred persons. It is chiefly used as an asylum for poor outcast lepers, who receive daily small allowances of rice for their support, but are permitted at the same time to wander about the streets to the great annoyance of shop-keepers and passers by, from whom they solicit alms. Although this lazaretto was intended originally to seclude its inmates from society, yet through misma- nagement, it not only does not effect this object, but through the connivance of the proper authorities, the police make a practice of extorting large bribes from the rich, who, if discovered to be affected with this disease, are seized and threatened to be put into that place of filth and contagion, unless they pay handsomely for the exemp tion. The demand is paid, and their names enrolled in the books as being there, which with a ticket they receive, prevent any further molestation. Leprosy is regarded as so unclean and contagious a disease, that when a family or a branch of a family, is infested with it, it shuts them out from all direct intercourse with their relations and friends. Thus a father banishes his child, and the children their parent, for they dare not eat or live with him, lest they also should be contaminated; and thus these poor creatures are avoided by all and pitied by none. Besides the lazar house, there is a part of the city appropriated for the lepers, who there live and trade to- gether, not daring to intermarry with others. I have been informed by