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TABLE C.
Table C exhibits the mortalities of the two Bombay epidemics during their periods of ascension. Accepting the increase in Plague in Bombay from the middle of December as marking the beginning of a fresh epidemic, the thirteen weeks or three months spread of the epidemic came to a close at the end of the first week of March. In calculating the waxing three months of an epidemic, the difficulty is to fix the initial week. It is not till the decline sets in that the date of the true epidemic increase can be determined. In the present case the decline began from March the 20th: this supports the view that the second epidemic dates from about the middle or the third week of December.
The thirteen weeks period, which is indicated by the total figures for both epidemics, is very largely borne out by the individual section figures at Table A, but it would perhaps be rash to state positively that this is a true feature of Plague in general or even of Bombay Plague in particular.
It should be here noted that since from various causes there are observable discrepancies in the returns of recorded Plague from different quarters, the probable or estimated Plague figures are best obtained by the process of subtracting the average mortality for any given period of the five years preceding 1896, from the mortality for the corresponding periods in 1897 or 1898, and assigning the difference to Plague. A comparison of this result with the recorded figures gives a fair line of the course of the epidemic.