Epidemics. 193- 



of the writers of the Aphrodisiacus, and also by the learned 

 Sprengel, who gives a very interesting disquisition on 

 syphilis in his " History of Medicine." 



The opinion already given about syphilis being a hybrid 

 between leprosy and plague, arose from the reading of his- 

 tory generally, and appeared to be forced upon the attention 

 by a close analysis of a large number of dissimilar and 

 closely co-related facts, scattered over a great variety of his- 

 torical incidents, from the time of Constantine the Great on 

 to our own times ; and it was pleasant to find the same 

 foot-path had been trodden by men whose learning and 

 judgment are deserving of much respect, and whose sen- 

 timents were hailed as a confirmation that both were going, 

 at least part way on the same journey. There is yet 

 another disease whose origin is interesting and singular,, 

 and for the details of which we have an eye-witness and 

 personal sufferer, whose powers of observation and careful- 

 ness of description place him at the head of all chroniclers 

 of disease that history has given. This disease is the 

 Athenian plague, as recorded by Thucydides.* 



" When they had not been many days in Attica, the 

 plague first began to show itself amongst the Athenians ;. 

 though it was said to have previously lighted on many 

 places about Lemnos and elsewhere. Such a pestilence,, 

 however, and loss of life as this was nowhere remembered 

 to have happened. For neither were physicians of any 

 avail at first, treating it as they did, in ignorance of its. 

 nature nay, they themselves died most of all, inasmuch as- 

 they most visited the sick nor any other art of man. And 

 as to the supplications that they offered in their temples, or 

 the divinations, and similar means, that they had recourse 

 to, they were all unavailing ; and at last they ceased from, 

 them, being overcome by the pressure of the calamity. 



* After comparing many translations, epitomes, and compliments to 

 Lucretius, the introduction of a verbal and exact translation of Thucy- 

 dides' description of the plague of Athens, by the Rev. H. Dale, is. 

 perhaps the fairest way of examining the whole subject. 



13 



