Office of the Historian

No. 300.
Mr. Bingham to Mr. Evarts.

United States Legation,
Tokei, Japan, August 11, 1879. (Received September 4.)
No. 934.]

Sir: Referring to my No. 929, of date the 8th instant, in which I had the honor to inclose cholera statistics up to the 25th ultimo, I now beg leave to inclose herewith further statistics of the pestilence up to the 4th instant, as published in the Tokei Times of the 9th instant, by authority of the interior department of this government.

This table shows that up to the 4th instant the number of cholera cases in the empire as reported was 41,647; that the number of deaths therefrom to that date were 23,350, and that the death-rate was 56.07 per centum. All this mortality was confined to the places named in the inclosure with my No. 929.

It is painful to note that in the doomed city of Osaka, the number of cases of cholera up to the 4th of August was 6,941, and of deaths from that disease to that day the number was 5,407. It is to be observed that, aided doubtless by the refusal of certain foreign powers to observe and enforce the quarantine regulations of this government, the importation of the disease into Kanagawa and Tokei has gone on until since the quarantine of the 1st of July (when there were no cholera cases officially reported in either city) it is now reported officially that both cities are infected with the pestilence, and that up to the 4th instant in Tokei there were 248 cholera cases, of which 135 were fatal, and in Kanagawa (Yokohama) 192 cases, of which 98 were fatal, showing a mortality in the former of 54.44 per cent, and in the latter of 51:04 per

I have, &c.,

JNO. A. BINGHAM.
[Inclosure in No. 934.—Extract from the Tokio Times, August 9, 1879.]

A table of cholera statistics carefully prepared by the home departments inform us that up to the 4th of August the number of cases reported in the entire, country was 41,647. Of these 23,350 were fatal, 5,054 having been cured. Under, treatment there were 13,243, and the percentage of mortality was 56.07. The ken most seriously affected was that of Osaca, where the number of seizures was 6,941, and of deaths 5,407. Other kens were visited in the following order of severity: Hiogo, Okayama, Yéhime, Sakai, Oita, Yamaguchi, Hiroshima, Wakayama, and Fuknoka, the last named having 1,204 cases and 474 deaths.

In the remaining parts of the empire the epidemic had not obtained so strong a foothold, but its growth in this particular vicinity was undoubtedly becoming rapid. Until the 26th of July there had been only 82 patients in Tokei, and 9 in Kanagawa ken. By the 4th of August there had been 248 attacks and 135 deaths in Tokio; and in Kanagawa 192 attacks and 98 deaths. The percentage of fatalities in Tokio was 54 44; in Kanagawa 51.04. It is in consequence of these serious increases that the two places have been declared “infected,” as is more particularly explained in an article on another page of this paper.