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in their power to assist, and it is incumbent on all local health authori-

ties to keep the local railway officers in touch with the measures they

intend to take, and to invite their co-operation in so far as railway

colonies and station premises are concerned. As soon as the local health

authorities are ready with their plans of campaign, they should inform

the railway authorities of the steps they propose to take. Railway goods

yards and stores are frequently known foci for plague, and whenever a

local board or municipality carries out preventive measures in the

vicinity, identical measures should be conducted simultaneously in the

railway yards.

20. (ii) Persons.-Control of the movements of persons is of less

importance than that of grain. The passport system has been dis-

credited. The segregation of the sick is not essential. The disinfection

of clothes and baggage is not generally practicable. In the case of towns

it is well nigh impossible to give effect to the provisions of Plague

Regulation No. 10.

21. Village boycott.-In the case of the ordinary village, there is no

real reason why the headman should not compel persons suspected of

coming from an infected place to have his clothes and personal effects

sun-dried or, in the alternative, to remain outside for a couple of days.

Nor should he have difficulty in preventing grain consignments from

getting into his village until both grain and bags have been disinfected

by the sun. In some parts of the Presidency this system of 'village

boycott' has been adopted with success by the villagers on their own

initiative. But there is reason to believe that villagers are not generally

aware of the drastic powers with which their headmen are invested.

22. It is regrettable that in the past this very useful measure has

been almost entirely neglected, and there seems to be great need for

spreading information regarding this measure among the people of the

Presidency. Where it has been adopted, it has proved of the greatest

value, and all district health authorities should see that the people in their

districts are made fully aware of their powers in this respect and of the

value of these powers.

23. Evacuation may also be encouraged, but it rests with local bodies

to provide accommodation for those who have been rendered homeless.

Evacuation should be carefully controlled by the health staff who should

see that temporary huts are erected on a convenient and suitable site

and that they are occupied only after the bedding, clothing and other

personal effects from the evacuated houses have been well exposed to the

sun's rays. Emigration from infected to uninfected places is commonly

responsible for the spread of plague, and local bodies and their health

staffs should endeavour to control any such movement, and should en-

courage villagers and townsfolk to carry out the method of village

boycott already described. Plague refugees should at all times be

accorded a very cold welcome. The close supervision of all such move-

ments is, in any case, a very important duty devolving on district

health staffs, and the duty is not rendered any easier when the people

carry out these migrations, as they usually do, surreptitiously and during

the hours of darkness.

24. (d) Inoculation.-Once plague has occurred or threatens to break

out, no time should be lost in conducting an inoculation campaign. The

protection that inoculation affords need not be enlarged upon here, but