56 Dr. AiNSLiE on Small-Pox and Inoculation in Eastern Countries. 



published on the subject. Aaron of Alexandria, a distinguished author in 

 the time of Mahomet, gave some account of the disease, according to the 

 testimony of Rhazis,* who himself treats both of this and the measles, and 

 who is, indeed, as Woodville justly allows, the principal amongst the old 

 physicians in whose works, still extant, the attention of the world was called 

 to the then reigning calamity. Aaron was a very voluminous writer, an adept 

 in medicine as well as a priest of Alexandria, when that city was besieged 

 by the Saracens, and was by every account highly esteemed in Arabia. It 

 is a curious fact, that this learned man does not take the least notice of the 

 contagious nature of the small-pox, but supposed it to proceed from an ebul- 

 lition of the blood.t He it was, by all I can learn, who originally adopted the 

 hypothesis of an adust blood and bile, of corrupt humours, and, what is inte- 

 resting to know, of "refrigerants which could retain pustules, and warm medi- 

 " cines which could expel them externally." realities which formed the basis 

 of that method of treating the malady, by the free admission of cool air and 

 other antiphlogistic means, first distinctly suggested by Sydenham,? afterwards 

 improved by Boerhaave,§ and finally meliorated and established byCullen in 

 1779. The next authors, in order of time, who wrote on the disorder, were 

 Bachtishua and John the son of Mesne. The first was physician to the Caliph 

 Almansor, in the eighth century ; and, according to Rhazis, || maintained 

 that the measles were occasioned by blood mixed with a large proportion of 

 bile, and that the small-pox proceeded from an over gross and moist blood. 

 The latter (John the son of Mesne) flourished towards the beginning of the 

 ninth century ; though, according to some, at a later period, he was a 

 physician at the court of Haroun al Raschid, and renowned for his general 

 learning as well as professional zeal. 



Of the labours of the Arabian writers just mentioned, but a few scattered 

 fragments have escaped the ravages of time ; but the works of Isaak tlie 

 Israelite, remain. The exact time in which he lived cannot be distinctly 

 ascertained ; but, from the order in which Hali Abbas quotes him, it may 

 have been in the ninth century. He would seem to have been an intelli- 



* Vide Rhazis de variolis et morbillis. Edit. Canning, 

 f See Dr. Mason Good's " Study of Medicine, vol. ii. p. 619. 

 J Born at Winford Eagle in Dorsetshire, in 1624. 



§ Born near Leyden, in 1668, and became the most celebrated medical writer and practitioner 

 of his day. 

 11 Vide Rhazis. 



