602 . PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1722. 



close application of the variolous matter to her skin, when her body was heated 

 with exercise. Which seems to prove, that such an application is more 

 effectual to give the infection than the bare morbid effluvia, arising from the 

 body of the sick person, and received into the sound one by inspiration; for 

 that she received no infection by inspiration is plain, from the appearing of the 

 small pox upon those parts only where there had been such an application and 

 contact. From which it appears very probable, that a person who has already 

 had the small-pox, as the man inoculated by Mr. Tanner in St. Thomas's Hos- 

 pital, may possibly receive it again in some slight degree by inoculation; that 

 being still a more close and immediate application of the variolous matter to the 

 blood and juices of the sound person, than when it is applied only by contact 

 to the skin whole and unwounded. 



2. That the infection communicated to this woman not being universal, as 

 appears from her having no fever, or sickness, or general eruption of the pus- 

 tules all over her body, but only on the parts infected by immediate contact, 

 no argument can be drawn from hence, for a person's being liable to undergo 

 the smalUpox a second time, so as to have the usual symptoms of that disease, 

 and a general eruption of the pustules, but rather the contrary. 



3. That the time in which this infection showed itself, by the appearance of 

 the pustules, is very different from that observed on inoculation ; the first ap- 

 pearing in about a day and a half; whereas in the latter case, the eruption gene- 

 rally shows itself on the J 0th day, or not above a day sooner or later, as appears 

 from the accurate and curious observations of Dr. Nettleton. Which difference 

 is what ought in reason to be expected, since in one case the infection went no 

 farther than the parts affected by immediate contact; whereas in the other it 

 must be propagated through the mass of blood to all parts of the body. 



j4n Account of two Observations on the Cataract of the Eye. By Sig. Antonio 

 Benevolif Master Surgeon in the Hospital of S. Maria Nuova in Florence, 

 N°373, p. 194. 



On the I3th of July, 17^0, S. Benevoli had couched a German soldier of 

 cataracts in both his eyes, who immediately after the operation recovered the 

 sight of them, and continued to see till his death, which happened by an acute 

 illness on the 6th of April, 1722. On this, S. Benevoli took the eyes out of 

 their orbits, in order to examine whether the cataracts, which this soldier had 

 been couched of, consisted of a membranous pellicle, as some writers maintain; 

 or, as others pretend, of a preternatural opacity in the crystalline humour. 

 Proceeding immediately to the dissection of the left eye, on a careful and very 

 exact examination of all its contents, he could not find any such thing as a 



