History of Animal Plagues. 255 



vigour in London from about the middle of Januan,?^ ^732-3, 

 for about three weeks. The bill of mortality, from Tuesday, the 

 23rd, to Tuesday, the 30th of January, contained in all 1588, 

 being higher than any time since the plague. It began in Paris 

 about the middle of their February, or the 21st of our January, 

 and lasted till the beginning of their April, or the 21 st of our 

 JMarch; and I think its duration was longest in the southerly 

 countries. It raged in Naples and in the southern parts of 

 Italv in our March. The disease, in travelling from place to 

 place, did not observe the direction, but went often contrary to 



the course of the winds It was matter of fact that there 



was a previous ill constitution of the air, noxious to animal 

 bodies. In autumn, and long afterwards, a madness among 

 doo-s. The horses were seized with the catarrh before mankind ; 

 and a gentleman averred to me that some birds, particularly the 

 sparrows, left the place where he was during the sickness.-' ^ A 

 medical society in Edinburgh gives another account of it : ' This 

 epidemic distemper, above described, spread itself over all Europe, 

 and also infested the inhabitants of America: so that it was, 

 perhaps, the most universal disease upon record. The first 

 accounts we have of anything like it this last year in Europe was 

 in the middle of November, from Saxony, Hanover, and other 

 neighbouring countries in Germany. It raged at the same time 

 in Edinburgh, and Basil, in Switzerland. It appeared in London 

 and in Flanders after the first week in January, towards the 

 middle of which it reached Paris, and about the end of the month 

 Ireland began to suffer. In the middle of February Leghorn 

 was attacked, and near the end of it the people of Naples and 

 Madrid were seized with it. In America it began in New 

 Eno-land about the middle of October, and travelled southward 

 to Barbadoes, Jamaica, Peru, and Mexico, much at the same 

 rate as it did in Europe.' ^ 



To our celebrated countryman, Gibson, we are indebted for 

 a really excellent description of the affection as it was observed 



' An Essay concerning the effects of Air on Human Bodies, by John Aybuthnot, 

 M.D. London, 1751, p. 193. 



'■' Medical Essays and Observations, published by a society in Edinburgh. 

 3rd edit. vol. ii. 



