294 Dr. Ainslie's Observations on the Lepra Arabum. 



1st. That women are less liable to suffer from Elephantiasis than men. 



2d. That the disease is most certainly hereditary. 



Sd. That its being in any degree contagious is extremely problematical. 



4th. That every leper, suffering from an advanced stage of the malady, 

 doubts whether he is capable of propagating his species. 



5th. That a fish diet is found to render every symptom worse. 



6th and lastly. That poor living, want of cleanliness, mendicant misery, 

 and exposure to cold and damp, are but the too constant attendants of this 

 dreadful affliction. 



Lorry, in speaking of leprosy, says, " Universum totius corporis cancrum 

 est ut omnes medici veteres eam vocant," and seems to have believed it to 

 be occasioned by black bile. The same author informs us, that, on opening 

 the body of a soldier who died of the Elephantiasis of the Greeks, the liver* 

 was found enlarged and indurated. Schillingt imagined, that the malady 

 might be caught by sleeping in the same bed with an infected person ; also 

 from the fetid odour of the ulcers. He prescribed for it the decoction of 

 a plant common in the marshes near Surinam, and there called Totidin .- 

 it is of the genus Paullinia. The Lepra Arabum is well described by Alibert 

 in his work on cutaneous disorders (page 46), under the name of " La 

 Lepre Tubercukuse ." he is of opinion that it is an affection of the lymphatic 

 system, and tells us that it is sometimes to be met with at Paris. As to 

 the mode of treatment, he speaks in rather desponding terms, and appears 

 chiefly to have trusted to wine, decoction of bark, and aromatic fomen- 

 tations. 



Most authors agree that improper food, and especially rotten or decayed 

 fish, is an exciting cause of the disease ; and we know that Sir William 

 Jonest informs us, that the Hindu doctors commonly ascribe it to drinking 

 copiously of milk after eating fish. On the other hand, we learn from an 

 account of the Lepra as it shows itself at the Isle of France, § that it is to 

 be cured by the use of turtle. That the complaint could ever be brought 

 on by the over use of maize or millet, as Cassal supposed, is highly impro- 

 bable ; but such a notion it would appear prevails in the Asturias : || that 



* See Alibert on Diseases of the Skin, page 94. t See same work, page 90. 



X See his works, vol. i. page 356. 



J See Edinburgh Medical Journal, October 1823. 



II See Alibert, page 88. 



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