68 Dr. AiNSLiE on Small-Fox and Inoculation in Eastern Countries. 



written by W. Bruce, Esq., resident at Bushire, to W, Erskine, Esq., of 

 Bombay, which appeared in the Asiatic Journal for June 1819 ; and to which 

 my attention has been called by my friend, Dr. B. G. Babington, late of 

 Madras. 



Extract from the above-mentioned Letter. 



" When I was in Bombay, I mentioned to you that the cow-pox was 

 " well-known in Persia by the Illyauts, or wandering tribes. Since my 

 " return here (Bushire), I have made very particular inquiries on that 

 " subject, amongst several tribes who visit this place in the winter, to sell 

 " the produce of their flocks, such as carpets, rugs, butter, cheese, &c. 

 " Their flocks, during this time, are spread over the low country to graze. 

 " Every Illyaut whom I have spoken to on this head, of at least six or seven 

 " different tribes, has uniformly told me, that the people who are employed 

 « to milk the cattle caught a disease, which having once had they were 

 " afterwards perfectly safe from the small-pox ; that this disorder was 

 " prevalent amongst the cows, and shewed itself particularly on the teats ; 

 " but that it was still more common among, and more frequently caught 

 " from, the sheep. Now this is a circumstance that has never, I believe, 

 " before been known, and of the truth of which I have not the smallest 

 " doubt. To be sure on the subject, I made more particular inquiry of a 

 " very respectable farmer who resides in my neighbourliood, named Malilla 

 " (and whom Mr. Stephen Babington knows well). This man confirmed 

 " every word that the Illyauts had said, and that his own sheep had it. 

 " There may be one reason for the Illyauts saying that they caught tiie 

 " malady oftener from the sheep than the cows ; which is, that most of 

 " their butter, ghee, and cheese, is made from sheeps' milk : their black 

 " cattle yield very little, being more used for draught than anything else." 

 Whatever may have been done formerly in India, vaccination, as it is 

 now there practised, was first introduced into that country through the 

 zealous exertions of European foreign physicians ; a description of men 

 whose humanity and philanthropy, thanks to heaven, flourished in spite of 

 aU the restrictions of the French revolution. The cow -pock fluid was taken 

 from cows in Lombardij by Dr. Sacco, and despaLched by D. de Carro from 

 Vienna to Bagdad, from which place it went by different stages to Bussora 

 and Bombay. The infected threads sent to the last-mentioned place failed j 

 but others, transmitted to Trincomallee, produced the vaccine disease there 



