The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1819-09-25 00:00:00

ON TILE DOCTRINE OF CONTAGION
IN THE PLAGUE.

MINUTES OF EVIDENCE BEFORE SELECT
COMMITTEE.
[Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed Jane 14,
NIA

(Contioued from our Paper of Friday, September 17.)

Luna., 15 die Marti.), 1819.
Sir JOHN JACKSON, Barwitt, is the Chair.

Charles 11I'Lean, If.D.'s examination continued.
You know it breaks out with great violence at particular
seasons?—ll am siot much acquainted with the slats of the

suell.pox iu the East Indies.
Can you define the pinto as distinct from any other
fever, by its symptoms?—As must necessarily happen of a
disease produced by causes uf such diffusive tittlnence,
and capable of 'mime ao variously moshbed, its phaeomena
embrace almost all the symptoms which the living body
is capable of exhibiting. But few of these, however,
ran occur at once in the same person : and there are sone,
which' can be considered pathagnonsonick. Most Only,
therefore, bas this disease been called Proteiforni. This
inference, Gum the unitive of things. to cunfirmed by fact'
and observations. " It is to various,' says Fra Louigi
di Pavia, who attended a plague hospital thirty years, " as
the complexions and constitutions of those unfiartueate
person+ whom it attacks," and if be bad pot believed in
contagion, lint bad been aware of the proper causes, he
would have added, " and u the solidifications, proportions,
and combinations of the causes operating." Iu general it
begins like other forms of fever, with a cold, succeeded
by a hot fit; and the fever fur the most part, partakes
of what have been called in the schools the nervous
(typhus) and the putrid. The expression of the couute-
natter, sod the appearance of the eyes, and of the tongue,
are the least variable of all the phenomena. " The surest
symptoms of the plague," says Era l,ouigi, " are the
ryes dusky and turbid, fixed and sparkling; the tongue
lurked, of a whitish colour, inclining to yellow, with the
extremity red, which branches oat in a number of small
ramifications exceedingly lammed." In the Pest House
at Constantinople, I observed that the appearance of
the couutenance is peculiar. It more nearly resembles the
desultory and wandering look, which lakes place in the
typhus of Batavia, and in the jungle fevers of other parts of
the East Indies, than the faluitous and fixed stare, which I
have met with in the yellow fever of the west. The skin
and muscles of the face exhibit a tremulous appearance,
which, with a certain fierceness of the eyes, and sometimes
an involuntary motion of one of the eyelids, as is winking,
gives a peculiar expression of counteauce; the whole con-
stituting rather a ludicrous wildness of aspect, increased
by the 'Tots of the patient, as if emotions of the inatitior-
ilinatiou of his features to preserve their composure. Era
Louigi remarks, that the rye of the side ea which eruption
hegius,becomes smaller thau the other; and that in prupurtion
as the eyes turn clearer, and the •ision more perfect, the hopes
of recovering are stronger. In the Pest Elt.spital I eileolved
the appearance of the tongue to be very various; " come-
times blackish, sometimes brown,sornelimes quite white, and
sow and then of a flesh red ; always, in *cycle caste, dry and
hard, and must commonly euvered with a thick mist, et-
iierally corresponding with the colour of the organ fur the
lime bring. I have also seen it of a glossy grey, stem:
Wing the first formation of icicles upon water; and this slate,
coterie paribait, appeared to promise the most favoarable
termination. My own tongue, aotwithatandiug that all the
other symptoms of consequence were removed before the
twelfth day of the disease, continued of a darkish brown
colour, dry, and with a disagreeable bitter taste, especially
about the rout, till the eighteenth day. The affections
the circulating system, and of the brain and nerves,
are extremely various, troth in respect to their degree,
and to the phenomena by which they are indicated.
The pulse varies both in streugth and velocity in a
remarkable degree. The affections of the brain in the
earlier and milder stages, are indicates' by a rapid and
unconnected succession of Was, a hurried speech, a
tremulous and unsteady walk, and • distracted brut; the
higher otrgrees are accumpanied by delirious, anxiety, I:m-
-eow, and melancholy, as well as great muscular debility
generally prevailed throughout. There is sumetinsee, at the
curnmencement, a considerable cu stipation but deorkera
and huotooltnge indicating a desolation of the texture
of
the blood, arc also in its progress not unfrequent nplosrls
.when severe denoting meets auger. In tbe Levalant, the
plague is tonally divided tuts six kiwis. The—true, or
her plague, is which the larger glands are swells d; ad
other tumors are called Carlene, and are divided lido five
classes, according to the degree of danger which they drover.
The disease is to be distinzuished by the aggregate of its
symptoms.
You have been is Cessilistinople?--1 bare.
TON know the salmi Psis
That is ceserally ishshited by Europeans?—By Greek%
owl tea better sort of Armenians gigot avid by Twits.
Yms ate aware Ike plaint makes nisei less ravage in that