88 THE CONTAGIOUS TYPHUS 



The partisans of the circumscribed origin, 

 who make it depend exclusively on the peculiar 

 organization of the race of the steppes, have based 

 their argument, peremptory and unanswerable 

 as they imagine, on the prime fact, that it has 

 always been possible to trace the diffusion of 

 the typhus in a given country, to some sick 

 animal of the steppes conveyed to that 

 kingdom. In this manner it is, that they ex- 

 plain the generation of the epizootics which 

 have so frequently wasted the continent of 

 Europe. On whatever point of the globe they 

 may appear, this, and only this, is the source of 

 their existence. The isolated position of Great 

 Britain is made to support their arguments. 

 " Behold," they exclaim, " Great Britain, 

 which, thanks to its surrounding seas, has 

 escaped most of the epizootics which have 

 desolated France and Germany during the 

 early part of the nineteenth century." Nay, 

 more, the present visitation of the distemper is 

 also seized upon to sustain their theory, since 

 certain oxen, natives of the steppes, appear to 

 have imported it into London. 



We must add, that nothing is wanting 

 in order to prove this assertion ; for they re- 



