To these causes we must add, the general condition of the back yards and enclosures in the town. All the prudential measures of an effective police seem to have been totally abandoned, and the committee are compelled to say, that every part of the town presented a striking proof of the extreme neglect of a large portion of our citizens to the ordinary duty they owe themselves and their neighbours—that of keeping their yards and possessions clear from every species of filth, which may be injurious to health. Ponds of water in various parts of the town were suffered to remain, undrained after the rains, and became stagnant, thus affecting the air with poisonous exhalations. Dead animals, heaps of oyster shells, and other offensive matter, were commonly observed through the town. Weeds were cut down, and suffered to decay without removal. A store upon one of the new wharves contained a large quantity of hides during the months of August and September, and the greater part of October, in a most offensive state—such an outrage against the health of the inhabitants is scarcely credible. In this general state of the town, succeeded the violent hurricane of the 28th and 29th of July, from the S. and S. E. which raised the water to an uncommon height, overflowing all the wharves, and the foundations of the buildings on Water Street, even to the height of several inches in many store rooms; leaving, as the water subsided, a vast quantity of logs, drift wood, sea-weed, and other vegetable matter in the streets and lots, much of which was there suffered to decay and infect the air. The docks were clogged up with like materials, and damaged barges and vessels. No attention whatever seems to have been paid to cleaning the docks after the storm, to give a free circulation to the water, too much confined before by the mode of building wharves. The committee feel much regret that they are compelled, in discharge of the duty assigned them, to present such a view of the town anterior to, and immediately after the storm in July; but the facts were obvious to all, whether citizens or strangers, and evince an almost unparalleled indifference in regard to our own health. In such a state of our town, the most strenuous advocates for foreign importation of the yellow fever, will surely admit that there existed abundant causes for less malignant fever.