78 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1757- 



by experience, supported by verbal process, that this was the state of the diseased ; 

 that the distemper could neither be the pox, nor the effect of an inveterate one: 

 that it had no symptom of that disease; but that it had every character of what 

 the ancients called leprosy, elephantiasis, or such other names, as they were 

 pleased to give it. So that they did not hesitate to pronounce, that those in- 

 fected with this disease, as above described, ought to be treated as leprous persons, 

 and subject to the ordinances, which his majesty was pleased to issue against such 

 persons. 1 1 . Again, they were well assured, from their observations, that the 

 distemper was contagious, and hereditary ; and yet the contagion is not so active, 

 nor poisonous, as that of the plague, small-pox, nor even as the ring-worm, 

 itch, scald, and other cutaneous disorders: for, if that were the case, the Ame- 

 rican colonies would be utterly destroyed; and these persons so infected, mixed 

 as they are in every habitation, would have already infected all the Negroes whom 

 they come near. 12. They believed that this contagion did not take place but 

 by long frequenting the company of the infected, or by carnal knowledge. Be- 

 sides, they had observed that even such long frequenting, or cohabiting with 

 them, were not always sufficient to communicate the disease; because they had 

 seen women cohabit with their husbands, and husbands with their wives, in the 

 distemper, while one was sound, and the other infected. They saw families 

 communicate and live with leprous persons, yet never be infected; and thus, 

 though experience, and the information of the sick, prove the contagion, they 

 were of opinion, that there must be a particular disposition in people to receive 

 the poison of the leprosy. 13. As to what regards the distemper's being here- 

 ditary, it is assuredly so. They had seen entire families infected; and almost 

 every child of a leprous father or mother fall insensibly into the leprosy; and yet, 

 in several other families, they had seen some children sound, and others tainted; 

 the father had died of the disease, and the children grew old without any infec- 

 tion : so that, though it was certainly hereditary, yet they believed it was of the 

 same nature with those in families troubled with the consumption, gravel, and 

 other hereditary distempers; which are transmitted from father to son, without 

 being so very regular, as to effect every one of the family. 14. They could 

 never find out any certain rule of judging, at what age the disease showed itself 

 first in those who were begotten by infected parents ; but they had, as far as they 

 could, observed, with regard to women or girls, that the symptoms began with 

 the menses, and continued slightly till they had lain-in of a child or two ; but 

 that then more visible, and indeed more cruel, symptoms appeared. As to men, 

 or infants, there was no rule to know it in them. 15. For the explanation of 

 the causes, symptoms, and what they thought the most likely means of cure, 

 they referred to a particular dissertation. Let it suffice here to observe, tliat 

 they did not imagine that the air, water, or manner of living, could produce it; 



