582 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1755, 



archs, to obtain for him a register of the births and burials of their respective 

 communities; but at length they acknowledged it impossible. Their parishes 

 are farmed to curates, by the diocesan bishops ; the income arises from births and 

 burials; so that to conceal the former, they must likewise the latter; and they 

 never exhibit a faithful register. 



3. That there are more women than men born in the east, seems a figment of 

 travellers, rather than founded in truth ; it is scarcely to be known where poly- 

 gamy is lawful. The apparent conclusion may seem natural, because many of 

 the harems of the opulent, especially in the great cities, are numerous : but these 

 are not composed of the natives of those cities, but are brought from countries where 

 the Christian rites are observed ; in time of peace, from Georgia, and in war 

 from Hungary and Russia, &c. so that if more women are found in such fa- 

 milies than men, they must be considered as an extraneous production annually 

 or daily imported. 



4. Mr. P. affirms it as a truth, that in general, Mahometans, notwithstand- 

 ing their law^ procreate less than Christians. The rich, who are the only persons 

 that can maintain concubines, have seldom 4 or 5 children. Few exceed 2 or 3; 

 many of the former, and most of the middling and poorer sort, have generally 

 but one wife. The latter indeed exchange them with facility ; but yet we do 

 not perceive they have a numerous progeny. He thinks this arises from a cause 

 different from that which is commonly assigned, not from their being enervated 

 by variety, but rather from their law. The frequent ablutions, required by the 

 doctrine of purity and impurity, perhaps may check the natural passion ; or when 

 it is at its height, they find themselves prohibited enjoyment. 



5. Inoculation is practised at present among the Greeks, and, notwithstand- 

 ing religious scruples, among the Romanists : with the few he had known, it 

 generally succeeded ; but the numbers will not admit of comparison. There 

 are not perhaps 20 in a year inoculated. The Timoni family pretend, that a 

 daughter had been inoculated at 6 months old, but afterwards acquired the small- 

 pox in the natural way, and diet! at 23 years. The evidence is doubtful. Ti- 

 moni's account is incorrect ; his facts are not to be depended on. Pylarini's is 

 more exact. It was neither Circassians, Georgians, nor Asiatics, who introduced 

 the practice. The first woman was of the Morea ; her successor was a Bosniac; 

 they brought it from Thessaly, or the Peloponnesus, now Morea. They pro- 

 perly scarified the patient, commonly on many parts, sometimes on the forehead, 

 under the hair, sometimes on the cheeks, and on the radius of the arm. A 

 father told Mr. P., that the old woman not being able, through age, to make 

 the incision on his daughter, with the razor, he performed that operation. The 

 needle has also been used. The Turks never inoculate : they trust to their 

 fatum. Whence the method had its origin seems here unknown. A Capuchin 



