Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1881-05-25
WHOLE NO. 2020,
DRLAOK pEGTan IN THE EAST.

Already Europe IL becoming alarmed
At lhe appearance OF tho plague OF
black death, In tho East, aud fears are
expressed that 1t may spread westward
n, therefore, becomes important 20
know tho character Of the disease lhe
London Hmird states, on pathological
grounds, that II Is q livery malignant
form OF contagious fever" when
breaks ont suddenly In certain localities
and spreads with fiigltlul rapidly and
that tho present "type" IL w. Wrlloh'
AZ that Of tho Middle Ages, II Il char
aoteHHtle hy swclllngs OF the lympha'iee
glands aud by carbunelea, aud beyond
doubt Quo seizure seems TO aiiord no So
curity against q second attack Ihish'
however, q point upon which phyHlelaha
have not often had o chance to study
since "the post" docs not usually lcaVe,
,ho same individual u chance OF
experiencing its symptoms twice,
II has been cOntondod that IL
Il not contagious, but in almost
every ease Of an outbreak the disease
has been traced to persons who hayo
come from infected districts, In the
Astrakhan epidemic Of 1879, and In
that OF III, which cut of 100000 peo'
plo In Moscow, tho pestilence was
known TO have been brought, In ono
instance, from Central Asia, and In tho
other from Choczin, Again, during
the latter outbreak, tho l,iOO inmates
OF tho Imperial ioundling hospital, Who
were isolated, and IN 1913 the town OF
Jcgla, In Malta, which was shut oil
from Valctta, where tho disease was
raging, entirely escaped, Quarantine,
however, as preventive against tho
iayagos Of tho cholera, has been proved
to be utterly futile, and II is very gem
orally allowed that II Ia not much more
potent as q barrier against tho plague.
No Other form Of death has ever enlist
cd into its service historians OF such
brilliant talent. Do Foo could not
have been an eyewitness OF the
horrible scenes Of 1866 in London. But
he had doubtless talked TO many who
had survived those dreadful times and
were familiar with the tales Of the corpse
carrying wagon goingi Its dismal rounds,
OF the living being unable to carry out
tho dead, and London deserted by the
court and, indeed, all whocould escape
into the country. In "Rien2" the late
Lord Lytton has given an account
scarcely less pictorial OF the plague IN
Florence, and in almost every other Eu-
ropcan country the "pest' which crept
like foul miasma over Asia, Northern
Africa and Europe, from Naples to
Archangel, and even to distant Green.
land, where il smote the Esquimaux
by thousands, has secured such able
chroniclcrs that, at the slightest
sign Of its reappearance, Western
Europe naturally grows alarmed In the
years 13lS, 1861, 1868, 1863 and 1907
London was visited by the "black
DEATH" though those early attacks OF
the disease sink into insigniticance
when compared with that which desc
lated the city in 1865, the year which
will ever be known as "the year OF
the plague" In reality, however,
though il caused before Christmas q
mortality of0s, 59Gout ofthe five hundred
thousand people which the metropolis
then contained, it did not abate till
1866, while in the thirteen subsequent
years there were many fatal cases
recorded. But after 1879 no death from
plague is know to have occurred, and
in l70l so entirely had it disappeared
that the name Of the disease was actually
omitted from the bills Of mortality
Ns,c York Herald.