SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XL. No. 1018 



B.C., and that it gradually became more common 

 during the next two hundred years. If this be so, 

 it is at least a plausible conjecture that it was in- 

 troduced by Hannibal's Carthaginian mercenaries. 

 Africa seems to have been the original home of the 

 disease, and it is probable that some of his troops 

 were infected. The constantly repeated devasta- 

 tion of Italy in the second Punic war should be sure 

 to turn a large part of it into marshy land, thus 

 affording a convenient breeding-place to the mos- 

 quitoes which were infected by the malarial pa- 

 tients among the Carthaginians. The similar con- 

 dition of Attica during the closing years of the 

 fifth century B.C. offers a striking parallel. This 

 opinion does not rest on mere conjecture. We are 

 told by Livy that in the year 208 B.C. a severe epi- 

 demic attacked Italy. It did not cause many 

 deaths, but resulted in much lingering disease, that 

 is, most probably, chronic malaria. 



Malaria, however, was not the only dis- 

 ease which contributed to the degeneration 

 of the Roman people. I have already re- 

 ferred to the pestilence of the third cen- 

 tury, which is said to have destroyed half 

 the inhabitants of the vast empire within 

 fifteen years. This certainly was not 

 malaria. Moreover, this was not the first 

 great pestilence which afflicted the Roman 

 Empire. Neuburger says : 



The "plague," so called by Galen or Antonine, 

 was first introduced from Syria by the Eoman army. 

 . . . The extraordinary contagiousness of the epi- 

 demic is emphasized in all contemporary reports, 

 There appear to have been a variety of simultane 

 ous manifestations, the descriptions indicating 

 afBiotions chiefly resembling small-pox or dysentery, 

 but adequate criteria on which to express an opin- 

 ion are wanting. The "plague" commenced 165 

 A.D., claimed innumerable victims and lasted at 

 least fifteen years. 



Jerome writes: With peace, order and good gov- 

 ernment a curious lethargy fell on the warrior state 

 deepening into a coma in which it died so quietly 

 that neither the contemporaries nor we moderns 

 can fix the date of the disease. The fact, however, 

 finally became apparent when the phenomena of 

 decay were indubitable and the world, deprived of 

 the master, fell back helplessly into a condition 

 hardly more advanced than in the ages before its 

 subjection, save that it had the imperishable mem- 

 ory of Rome to give it hope, direction and courage. 



In the fourth century the seat of govern- 

 ment was removed to Byzantium. It is 

 probable that this change was, in part at 

 least, determined by the insalubrity of 

 Italy. Early in the fifth century Rome 

 was pillaged, but the real conquerors of 

 Rome were not the Goth and Vandals, 

 but malaria and the plague. Disease con- 

 tinued to devastate Italy. Creighton says : 



About the year 668 the English archbishop-elect, 

 Vighard, having come to Rome to get his election 

 confirmed by the pope, Vitalanius, was soon after 

 his arrival cut off by the pestilence with almost all 

 who had gone with him. Twelve years after, in 

 680, there was another severe pestilence in the 

 months of July, August and September, causing a 

 great mortality at Rome and such a panic at Pavia 

 that the inhabitants fled to the mountains. In 

 746 a pestilence is said to have advanced from 

 Sicily and Calabria and to have made such devas- 

 tation in Rome that there were houses without a 

 single inhabitant left. 



From that time on the plague periodically 

 spread over Italy until the seventeenth cen- 

 tury, while malaria has been in continuous 

 possession down to our own time. "We are 

 told that the epidemic of 1348 reduced the 

 inhabitants of the Eternal City to 20,000. 



We are familiar with the graphic descrip- 

 tion of the plague in Florence by Boccaccio, 

 who wrote: 



Such was the cruelty of Heaven, and perhaps of 

 men, that between March and July following, it 's 

 supposed, and made pretty certain, that upwards 

 of a hundred thousand souls perished in the city 

 only, whereas, before that calamity, it was not 

 supposed to have contained so many inhabitants. 

 What magnificent dwellings, what noble palaces 

 were then depopulated to the last person, what 

 families extinct, what riches and vast possessions 

 left, and no known heir to inherit, what numbers of 

 both sexes in the prime and vigor of youth — whom 

 in the morning neither Galen, Hippocrates nor 

 Esculapius himself, but would have declared in 

 perfect health — after dining heartily with their 

 friends here, have supped with their departed 

 friends in the other world. 



There are but few passages in literature 

 so tragic as the short record of the plague 



