638 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1917. 



Anna Friedberger of the same place, covered little more than two 

 years, for in May, 1526, he returned to Ingolstadt to become a lecturer 

 of medicine at the university, and also to practice his profession. He 

 must already have won some distinction in this direction, for other- 

 wise Margrave George of Ansbach would not have appointed him his 

 court physician. He entered upon his new duties in May, 1528, and 

 soon gained the confidence and friendship of the margrave, who also 

 had accepted Luther's doctrines. He became known as a successful 

 physician, especially through his treatment of the English sweating 

 disease, which in 1529 spread over a large part of Europe. I can not 

 find any publication of his, either in Latin or in German, which deals 

 with this subject, but I find in the Catalogue of Printed Books in the 

 British Museum the following entry : 



A most worthy practise of * * * L. Fuchsius * * * moste neces- 

 sary in this needful tynie of our visitation * * * both for the sicke and 

 for them that would avoyde the daunger of the contagion. Rouland Hall for 

 M. [ichael] Lobley, London, n. d. 



This copy is the only one in existence, so far as I am able to trace ; 

 it evidently refers to Fuch's treatment and cure of the English 

 sweating sickness. Added to the entry, in brackets, is the date 1575, 

 with a query; but this date is without question a mistake. The 

 sweating sickness 1 visited England first in 1486, again in 1507, 

 1518, and 1529 (in which latter year it spread over a large part of 

 Europe) , and the last time in 1551. The book must have been printed 

 at an earlier date than 1575, for we know that Michael Lobley flour- 

 ished in London as a bookseller between 1531 and 1567, and that the 

 printer Rouland Hall died in 1563. 2 



In connection with this book, I wish to mention another work, the 

 authorship of which is attributed to Fuchs, and which, while dealing 

 with a different subject, may be characterized as an undertaking of 

 similar character. Albrecht von Haller quotes in his Bibliotheca 

 medicinse practice (Vol. I, 1776), among other writings by Fuchs: 

 Tabula oculorum morbus comprehendens, Tubingae, 1538, folio, 

 which entry Wilhelm Gottfried Ploucquet, 20 years later, copied in 

 his Initia bibliothecoe medico-practicae et chirurgicae, vol. vi. These 

 are the only two bibliographers who mention this work; in the 

 history of ophthalmology it was not known. In 1899 Dr. Edward 

 Pergens, of Brussels, a well-known oculist, and greatly interested in 

 the history of his specialty as well as in the history of medicine, 



1 Becker, T F. C. Der englische Schweiss, ein Arztlicher Beitrag zur Geschichte des 

 15 and 1G. Jabrhunderts. Berlin, T. C. F. Enslin, 1834. 



2 As the service of the British Museum is limited during the present war, I will com- 

 municate with the librarian after the war and will ask for a photostat copy, which may 

 enable me to give some more information as to whether the hook was really written by 

 Fuchs or whether it was the undertaking of an enterprising bookseller who took advantage 

 of an illustrious name to stimulate the sale. 



