and five or six buckets full of it mixed with decayed shavings, and emitting an offensive odour, were removed at the time. “It appears then, that besides an unusual number sleeping in the fore-cockpit, some of them at least had been exposed to a morbific miasma, exhaled from a festering mass of filth in the bottom of that part of the ship. The quantity of mud, no doubt, was small in comparison with what had accumulated when the vessel arrived at Spithead from the coast of Africa, yet the malaria eliminated from that small and circumscribed focus was equally virulent in its operation, and produced the same disease in a few who were placed within the sphere of its influence.” Such is a brief narrative of the circumstances connected with this ship and her crew. But it has been alleged that while the landing of the crew of the “Eclair,” at Boa Vista, afforded no benefit to the ship’s company, it inflicted a grievous evil on the inhabitants of the island; that several individuals in contact, or close proximity with the sick, became affected with the same kind of fever; that from these individuals the malady spread to others with whom they came in contact, and from these again to others, as from so many centres of contagion, until the disease became general over the island, thus affording a positive instance of the importation of epidemic disease. The alleged facts on which these representations rest are the following:— It is stated, that during the occupancy of the Fort by the crew, there was a small Portuguese guard stationed there; that this guard was several times relieved; that at the time when the “Eclair” left the island, the guard consisted of one negro and two European soldiers; that within three days after the sailing of the “Eclair” both Europeans were attacked with fever similar to that from which the crew of the “Eclair” had suffered; that the negro soldier, who, with his comrade—the man sent from Boa Vista to nurse the two Europeans—on returning from the small island to Porto Sal Rey, had been—“as a matter of precaution”—“restricted for [‘about 8’ or] 17 days to the occupation of a small hut at the northern end” of the town, was afterwards attacked,—though not confined to bed until the day following his return to barracks; and that a woman (Anna Gallinha), who lived next door to this hut, was the first person who was attacked with fever in the town. It is further stated that a man (Pathi), who had been a labourer on board the “Eclair,” was also attacked with fever, according to one account, on the day after the “Eclair” sailed; but according to another account, on the third day after that event. Such are the alleged facts, and the only ones bearing directly on the communication of a specific contagion by the crew of the “Eclair,” collected by Dr M‘William by personal inquiries on the spot; and these, in his opinion, present a chain of evidence sufficient to establish a positive instance of the importation of epidemic disease.