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By Dr. Manson.
481.-You mean a patch of ground above and to the West of Richmond Terrace?
A. Yes, at the South-west corner between the two ridges. The ridge we are on is an absolutely dry ridge. I don't think you would get water there if you were to sink three hundred feet. The ridges on both sides of us are wet ridges and we have water on both sides of us. There is another thing which has helped to make the neigh- bourhood unhealthy. Lately there has been a good deal of disturbance of the top soil, and while you have road making or levelling sites going on and you have trees in the vicinity, you will find the coolies employed will not use the places put up for them-- when they are put up for them to use-but they will be all over the hills. I could take you to places in that neighbourhood which would make you feel very ill indeed.
By Dr. Cantlie.
482.-What use do you mean to make of that well you spoke of?
A.---I mean to use it for drinking water entirely. I believe that the drinking of surface water is not good. There is a good deal of decomposed vegetable matter in it, especially about such damp places. Wherever you have damp you have decaying vege- tation, and I have not the slightest doubt a great deal of the illness down below in the town, West, is caused by the people drinking that filthy surface water, because it is not only filthy on account of decomposed vegetation, but from animal matter too. The coolies have to pay a cash to go to the public latrines. A cash saved is a cash gained to them and there are thousands of coolies who go up all round that neighbourhood. And then the surface water is scraped up. You see it not only in that plateau, but in the side channels down below. It drips into the side channels and is collected there. Now the side channels were polluted up to three or four months ago, when I complained of it, with the liquid portion of the night soil. The stench all along that road from the junction of the Bonham and Caine Roads and right away to College Gardens sometimes, but especially near the tanks, in the early morning when I got up at five o'clock was enough to stifle you; it was better when I returned about eight or nine, but you could smell it more or less all day long.
15th February.
EVIDENCE OF MR. F. A. HAzeland.
By the Chairman.
483. Had you fever in 1887 ?
A.-No.
484.-Had any one of your household fever in 1887?
A. Yes, my eldest brother and my sister.
485.-How often and at what dates?
A.-My brother once and my sister three times.
486.-Were the attacks all of the same nature as far as you know?
A.-I believe so.
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