The countries of the world : being a popular description of the various continents, islands, rivers, seas, and peoples of the globe . lands werea scandal even to seamen. They were proverbs for one kind of immorality: the peopleand their visitors simply revelled in debauchery, and the former are to-day reaping thefearful crop which their ancestors sowed. THE HAWAIIAN LEPERS. 37 Leprosy axd the Lepek Settlejiext. Leprosy is the ivTemesis of the Islands. The disease heing incurable, the Legislature,finding that it was spreading, and that the habits of the people rendered contagion impos-sible to
The countries of the world : being a popular description of the various continents, islands, rivers, seas, and peoples of the globe . lands werea scandal even to seamen. They were proverbs for one kind of immorality: the peopleand their visitors simply revelled in debauchery, and the former are to-day reaping thefearful crop which their ancestors sowed. THE HAWAIIAN LEPERS. 37 Leprosy axd the Lepek Settlejiext. Leprosy is the ivTemesis of the Islands. The disease heing incurable, the Legislature,finding that it was spreading, and that the habits of the people rendered contagion impos-sible to be avoided, passed a law in 18(J5 by which all infected persons, regardless of position,•were to be removed to the island of Molokai, there to be isolated from the world, andremain with nothing to do—but to die. The task was a painful one. Every effort wasmade by the natives to conceal such of their friends as were tainted with the terrible maladv,for they knew that once denounced it was the duty of the Islands Sheriffs to commit themfor life to the leper settlement. All sympathy and kindness, consistent with regard for the. VILLAUE UI (A favourite summer hiunt of the cUlzetis of Honolulu.) living, and the very existence of the Hawaiian nation, were paid the unfortunate peopleby the officials; and, indeed, it was not until that the Act was strictly carried intoforce. Then the number of lepers had become so alarmingly great that fear was entertainedthat it would also attack the whites. Between ISCC and 1874-, 1, were sent toMolokai, but the number affected is now rapidly decreasing; though, as the disease ishereditary, it will not be stamped out for a generation or two. No more terrible fatecan possibly await any one than this necessary separation from kith and kin. Mothersare torn from their children, children from their parents, and husband from wife—andas the deportes are necessarily pauperised, it is a grievous burden on the poor Hawaiiankingdom to
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Keywords: ., bookcentury180, bookdecade1870, bookpublisherlondon, bookyear1876
