In 1869 I treated many cases of malarial fever in Victoria County, most of them, however, occurring close to lagoons on the coast, and though I met with other scattered cases of it in the country, this was the only outbreak which could be entitled absolutely epidemic.
I recollect in May of that year I had 120 cases among the whites and coolies on a sugar estate, which was situated on the sea-coast, near the mouth of the Umgeni River; but the fever was confined to this estate and Verulam, where I had four cases, the total mortality, to the best of my recollection, numbering nine.
The cases of dysentery, on the other hand, were often perfectly intractable, and would sometimes yield to no mode of treatment, and this was especially the case at the end of summer, when the experience of a sudden chill would almost certainly induce the disease. Sickness was most prevalent, if care were not taken, at the change of the seasons, and when rains of an exceptional character took place, cases both of fever and dysentery of a severe type were always expected. After the disastrous flood of August, 1868, these expectations were realized to an unusual extent. This great flood lasted from August 28th to the 31st, inclusive, the downfall of rain being greater than the oldest inhabitants could recollect, 15.60 inches falling in 48 hours, and 17.11 inches during the four days that the storm continued.
I had a very narrow escape at the time, when going to visit the manager of Fenton Vacy, a sugar estate about four miles from Verulam. This gentleman had been under my care for some days, suffering from a most acute attack of dysentery, from which, I regret to say, he eventually died.
A tremendous rain, which at the time I allude to had continued two days, had caused the rivers along the coast to rise from twenty to thirty feet, washing away both the cane from the fields and the coffee trees from the hillsides. In addition, it carved out impassable gullies in the roads, and choking up the rivers themselves with the carcasses of dead oxen, broken reeds and trunks of trees, flooded the surrounding lands, and brought everything to a stand-still. Notwithstanding the terrible driving storm, I did not like the poor fellow to die all alone, without a last effort to save him, so mounting one of my best horses, I rode as far on the way as Mr. Tom Milner’s, one of Natal’s oldest sugar planters, at Redcliffe, where I had to cross a stream at a drift close in front of his mill. When I arrived there, the water was running like a mill-race, but as Fenton Vacy lay on the other side, I determined to make an attempt to get through. In the Field, some time after, I read a full and accurate account of my adventure, names only being altered, written by a visitor who was stopping for a few days at Redcliffe, and as the article contains an accurate description of the class of rain storms to which Natal is occasionally liable, I shall take the liberty of reproducing it. The writer says:
“After spending a few pleasant days at the Royal Hotel, D’Urban, I was told that a trip to Victoria County was the thing every one ought to do, and that the planters were always glad to receive visitors lately out from England. Accordingly, having had a horse lent me, I started on a little tour, intending to visit some of the principal estates. The chief caution the old hands gave me at D’Urban was, ‘Look out for the rains, and when they come, don’t attempt crossing any river by yourself,’ the soundness of which advice I had ample means of testing before my return.
“The first river on my road was the Umgeni, stretching across which was an iron bridge, at this time a good forty feet above the stream, which was running rapidly but smoothly out to sea, distant some half mile or so. This bridge had been erected at great cost and trouble, and was pronounced to be strong enough to resist any flood.
“After a day’s hard riding I arrived at a sugar estate in Victoria County, and received from its owner a pressing invitation to remain a day or two and look round the place.
“All the week heavy showers had been falling, off and on, yet there was nothing to indicate alarm to an uninitiated eye. But after dinner, while we were sitting in the verandah enjoying our pipes and watching the clouds as they swept past, my host suddenly exclaimed: ‘If this east wind lasts through the night, we shall have a flood before three days are over, if not sooner. It was just such a night as this ten years ago, and very much the same time of year (about the middle of August), when we had one of the worst floods that have occurred in the colony. That stream which you crossed to-day, near our mill, rose a good thirty or forty feet, and you will notice to-morrow that we have made that allowance in choosing a site for our buildings. I don’t believe it ever has risen more than this; but if it ever should, it will carry everything before it.’
“Next morning, Melville, my host, was up before me, pacing the verandah, and grumbling to himself. On my asking ‘What’s the matter?’ he came out with ‘Don’t you see, or didn’t you hear, that, just after we turned in last night, one of the most tremendous storms we have had for years came on? It’s been raining bucketfuls all night! And there’s that manager of mine, sleeping down close alongside the reservoir and mill, has never rung the bell yet to muster all hands, when he ought to have had every man out half an hour ago, looking after the drains and water courses. If you want to see a flood, you have got here just in time.’