A LAST ATTEMPT AT PREVENTION

Having reached the sezione of Porto, cholera first spread as a slow succession of isolated cases. During the twenty-four hours from midnight on Monday 1 September, however, the disease suddenly erupted as a full-scale epidemic. On that day 122 people were stricken and 82 died. Ironically, after the alarms of August, the emergency found Naples unprepared. During the final week of August a wave of panic had swept the city following the first official bills of mortality and seven acknowledged cholera-deaths. The churches filled, votive candles were lit, and the populace prayed to placate the wrath of God. On Saturday the 30th there was the reassuring news that there were no new cases. This report was greeted as a divine sign that the city had been spared. Sunday, 31 August, therefore, witnessed an orgy of excess as Neapolitans celebrated their deliverance with riotous drinking, a binge of eating and noisy processions in the streets.

Superstition increased the certainty that disaster had been averted by the will of God. On Friday there was a demonstration at a primary school in the Lower City. During the preceding days rumours concerning the still-mysterious disease and unaccustomed measures to disinfect the school premises had given rise to wicked suspicions in the minds of anxious mothers. They gathered in an angry crowd outside the school to remove their children from authorities they suspected of malevolent intentions. The fact that the municipal health inspectors arrived in force, accompanied by a detachment of armed guards, heightened the atmosphere of distrust. The tumultuous confrontation that ensued ended only after the large-scale deployment of police and carabinieri.