Welcome rain fell a few days og>, but the fall was too slight to be of any permanent benefit. There has been ho heavy rain and very litle snow) since August last, and conditions in Aistriets dependent on the rainfall are very serious. Beggars are multiply ing. Tt is not pleasant to come faerass a woman over 70 years of age compelled to beg her way from door to door, repelled in most places by owners and. their fierce dogs, and only {00 lad to snatch a morsel of bread to give her strength for another attempt.
Smallpox is very rife, including some cases of the fatal black small POX, and vaccination is being widely Undertaken, Coxstnucrion begins shortly on the new Isolation Hospital of the BMC. at the corner of Urkney and Limerick Roads, Tients'n at an est mated cost of $87,000 for the hospital proper and an additional $18,000 for nurses' home, The structures, dé- signs for which have been drawn up by the Tientsin Public Works Department, will be Mnished in July or August. In the meantime, the other hospitals of the Britis' Municipal Council are going through 2 shufing process. Patients in the Welling-fon Nursing Home will te moved to the maternity block in the Tunbridge Road Hospital. By the beginning of May all three sections of the General Hospital, maternity, medical and surgical. will be occupied and in operation,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.