De. Ainslie's Observations on the Lepra Arabum. 285 



not, at least during the early stages of the disorder, before the numbness of 

 the extremities has proceeded to its greatest height, or the general debility 

 becomes excessive. Nay, do we not every day see children, the professed 

 offspring of a leprous parent, whose legitimacy we have no right to doubt ? 



Perhaps there is no class of human infirmities into which greater confusion 

 has crept, than into that of cutaneous diseases ; the ancients themselves 

 appear to have adopted names in the most vague and indefinite manner ; 

 and the Arabian writers, their translators, and commentators, have unfor- 

 tunately been little more distinct ; this much, however, is certain, that the 

 Lepra Arabum is the Elephantiasis of the Greeks ; tlie Ekphantia of Haly 

 Abbas ; the Juzdm, also Ddul'dsad of the modern Arabs ; the Khdrah 

 of tlie Persians ; the Ara mauny •wanny of the Cingalese : by the Hindoos 

 it has got various appellations, Jagdru, Bar'd dzdr^ &'c. In Dakhini it is 

 often termed Ruggit Pitthie ; it is the Untat iji-iJj and Keddl J'jJ of the 

 Malays ; the Tubiig, also Cheureuh of the Javanese ; the Ma-fung of the 

 Chinese ; the Nambi of the Sumatrans, and the Kustam of the Tamools. 

 The Sanscrit name of it is Kusht'^ha (^'2') whence Hindi, Kbr', 



Dr. Hillary, in his work already cited (pp. 322, 335), makes an erroneous 

 distinction betwixt the malady now under consideration, and what he calls 

 " the leprosy of the joints ;" for the latter is nothing else than an advanced 

 stage of the former, and is termed by Dr. Towne, in his diseases of the 

 West-Indies, " the joint evil." Dr. Hillary further supposes, tliat the 

 leprosy of the joints is no where noticed by the Greek physicians, and only 

 by Haly Abbas amongst those ot Arabia ; a mistake, which, after having 

 made, however, he seems inclined to correct, by adding, " without indeed 

 they meant that sort of leprosy in which they mention the falling off of the 

 limbs." 



Aretaeus * of Cappadocia, who wrote in Greek, has given us, under the 

 title of Elephantiasis, perhaps the most perfect picture of this distemper that 

 has ever appeared ; and takes particular notice of the falling off of the 

 fingers and joints of the feet ; he farther adds, perhaps a little extravagantly. 



• A knowledge of the exact period at which Aretaeus lived appears to be one of the desiderata 

 in medical history. Le Clerc, in his " Histoire de la Medecine," says it is probable that he may 

 have been contemporary with Galen ; but this is merely conjecture : and of the two (Galen and 

 Areta;us) so much is only correctly known, that they lived during* the long interval betwixt 

 Pliny and Paul Eginatus, and Aetius. — See Hist, de la Medecine, pages 516, 517. 



2 P2 



