disease consist of microbes, which
are carried in swarms by the wind. If such a pestiferous current of air
strikes a place where soldiers are stationed, they are immediately
ordered to break camp, and in a few hours the whole force is marching at
a right angle with the wind, and after a day's march and a night's
bivouac the physicians are generally able to tell whether the troops are
out of the cholera district or not. If not, the march is continued day
after day, always at a right angle with that of the preceding day, until
the air contains no more cholera microbes.

Old officers of the army told me that they had seen the cholera pass
over one part of the camp attacking every fourth man on one side of the
camp street without touching a single one on the other. It is claimed
that the fear and anxiety caused by this dreadful malady are even more
dangerous than the disease itself.

One day while sitting at my breakfast table I received a message from
the University hospital that an American sailor was very anxious to see
me before he died. I immediately drove over there and was met at the
entrance by the president, Dr. J. M. Coates, but when I arrived in the
cholera apartment the man had just died. A sister of mercy was present
at his death-bed, and had promised to carry his last message to me,
which consisted in a greeting of love and a few trinkets to be sent to
his mother in the state of Maine. There was a large apartment filled
with cholera patients. Many of the native patients were visited by their
friends and relatives; for the Hindoos do not entertain any fear of
death, but rather court it, believing that a death caused by a
contagious disease or a poisonous snake is simply a dispensation of
Providence by which they are called away to a better life.

As an illustration of this fact I mention the following incident: One
day while I was inspecting an American vessel a Hindoo laborer fell
overboard, and a Norwegian sailor plunged into the water and saved him.
After being brought safely on the deck the Hindoo became so angry at the
Norwegian that he could have killed him, simply because he had prevented
his entering paradise. Such occurrences are quite frequent.

I mentioned that I met a sister of mercy at the death-bed of an American
cholera patient in the hospital. I cannot neglect this opportunity to
express my heartfelt gratitude to these noble women, the modern nuns of
the Catholic church. I have seen them in