AND LOWER EGYPT. ^55 



On the other hand, the vast quantity of fat with 

 which this animal is loaded, obstructing the per- 

 spiration in climates where the heat produces it so 

 abundantly, renders the Egyptians more liable 

 than elsewhere to the measles, a disease peculiar 

 to them, and which under a burning sky might 

 easily degenerate into a leprosy. Such a disposi- 

 tion as this was more than sufficient to inspire 

 Egyptians with detestation at a species of animal, 

 which appeared to be itself liable to a disease, and 

 to induce them to shun every tendency toward any 

 thing that could generate this abominable distem- 

 per. This was, in fact, the real cause of an aver- 

 sion, which the stupid superstition of the Jews has 

 retained in colder countries, where the hog is 

 among the number of animals most useful as a 

 nutriment of man. The Egyptians thought, that 

 being constitutionally subject to the leprosy, to 

 ringworms, and other cutaneous eruptions, which 

 in these parts assume a more decided degree of vi- 

 rulence, it was absolutely requisite to abstain al- 

 together from this sort of food. 



Abstinence from the flesh of the hog has been 

 transmitted to the present race of Egyptians. The 

 Cophts never eat it, any more than the Mahome* 

 tans ; so that nothing is more scarce in the Said than 

 this animal, where there are no Greeks, as in the 

 cities of Lower Egypt, who bring it up clandes- 

 tinely. 



