43S Report from the Select Committee appointed to consider 



extend to Sicily, in consequence of the prompt preca\itions that 

 were adopted : and, had there been the same at Malta, is per- 

 suaded that the disease would have been resisted in Um'me. The 

 plague has been known to be received in the lazarettos; has heard 

 many instances related by the Maltese, and produces evidence 

 of one ; the title page of a book, which represents a monument 

 raised to the memory of a grand master, for having arrested the 

 disease in the year 17-13. 



Being asked, If he knows any thing of the introduction of the 

 former plague that ravaged Malta, — begs to refer to a paper he 

 publisiied t n the disease, during his engagement, on the plague 

 at Malta, which was communicated to the Edinburgh Medical 

 and Surgical Jo\nnal, and published 1st April ISN. Read the 

 following pas-^age to the Committee : " It is somewhat remark- 

 able, that the history of the introfhictiou of the plague, when it 

 made such great ravages on the last occasion on the island, about 

 a century ago, was nearly similar to what is circulated of the pre- 

 sent ; being attributed to some linen brought from a Levant ves- 

 sel, by a Maltese shopkeeper ; which, after producing the dis- 

 ease in all those who first came in contact with it, ultimately dis- 

 seminated the malady throughout the whole population." 



During the late plague at Malta in 1813, the disease was ar- 

 rested from the moment that an adequate and a regularly orga- 

 nized polite was established, and the inhabitants shut up in their 

 houses, and other strict measures of quarantine enforced, (which 

 was the case at a very late period) in the month of August. From 

 the 16th August it went on decreasing on the average, but not 

 regularly, till it disappeared. Feels satisfied that the decline of 

 the complaint was very much owing to the prompt measures of 

 police ; and his reason is, that the thermometer rose inconsi- 

 derably in ])oiut of fact, while the disease was decreasing fast. 

 During his residence at Malta it did not appear to him that the 

 temperature of the air had any thing to do with the plague. Is 

 of opinion that a very high or a very low temperature would check 

 it. Believes that materially below 60 or probably at 60 degrees 

 of heat it cannot subsist; but it is bare conjecture. Thinks the 

 plague principally communicable by the touch. States the fol- 

 lowing circumstances as to the degrees of precaution used in each 

 of the military barracks. The Sicilian regiment, though situated 

 in a very infected part of the island, a place called Florian, escaped 

 by the promptness and vigilance of Col. Rivarolla. De Rolle's 

 regiment, which was in the healthiest spot, was invaded by the 

 disease, and evidently in consecjuence of their barrier admitting 

 a contact with persons on the outside. It was a barrier at which 

 you could shake hands with any person on the outside. In the 

 14th regiment, which was near the most unhealthy part of the 

 town, there was but one person buspectcd, and his disease was 



immediately 



