78 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIOKS. [aNNO 1714. 



collection of the author's works, published in 1722, by Dr. Smith, under the 

 title of Harmonia Mensurarum, making the first part of that work, which has 

 long been in the hands of mathematicians. 



jin Extract from the u4cta Eruditorum for the Month of March, 1713, /). 111. 

 De Contagiosd Epidemid, quce in Patavino Agro et to td fere Venetd ditione in 

 Boves irrepsit, Dissertatio. Auctore Bernardino Ramazziniy PractictB Medicincr 

 Professore Publico. Patavii, 1712, 6vo. N° 338, p. 46. 



A year and a half before the publication of this treatise, a dreadful and vio- 

 lent contagion seized the black cattle in the Venetian territories, and especially 

 in the neighbourhood of Padua. Like an increasing fire, it could neither be 

 extinguished nor stopped by any human means. 



It was first observed in Agro Vincentino, and soon discovered itself more 

 openly in the country, spreading every way, even to the very suburbs of Padua, 

 with a dreadful destruction of the cows and oxen. It also extended to some 

 parts of Germany, and still continued at the above-mentioned date in the terri- 

 tory of Milan. 



In this dissertation the author inquires into the causes of the distemper, and 

 points out what remedies should be used for putting a stop to it. According to 

 the account here given, this distemper among the horned cattle was a malignant 

 pestilential fever, accompanied with rigors, followed by a burning heat, quick 

 pulse, difficulty of breathing, &c. 



The author deduces this distemper from a contagious original. He says, it 

 is certain, that out of a great drove, such as the merchants bring yearly into 

 Italy, out of Dalmatia and the bordering countries, one beast happened to 



philosophizing, exhibiting the foundation on which the Newtonian philosophy was raised, and refuting 

 the objections of the Cartesians and all other philosophers against it. 



The publication of this edition of the Principia added greatly to Mr. Cotes's reputation ) which was 

 also much increased by several publications of his own, which soon after appeared; particularly the 

 above paper, the Logometria, in this volume of the Transactions, and another, on tlie great fiery 

 meteor, seen March tlie6th, 17 16, in vol. 31. His career, however, was soon arrested by the hand 

 of death, in this same year, in the very prime of life, in the 34th year of his age, to the great regret 

 of all lovers of the sciences. So high, indeed, was Newton's opinion of our author's genius, that 

 be used to say, " had Cotes lived, we should have known something." 



Mr. Cotes left behind him some ingenious and vauable tracts j part of which, with the Logometria! 

 were published in 1722, by Dr. Rob. Smith, his cousin, and successor in his professorship, and 

 afterward master of Trinity College, under the title of Harmonia Mensurasum, which contains a 

 number of very ingenious and learned works. He wrote also a Compendium of Arithmetic} likewise 

 on the Resolution of Equations; on Dioptrics; and on the Nature of Curves. Besides these tracts, 

 he drew up in the time of his lectures, a course of hydrostatical and pneumatical lectures, in Englisb, 

 published also by Dr. Smith in 1737, which are still held in great estimation. 



