60 
MEMOIR OF CAMPER. 
Our author’s investigations regarding this epide- 
mic, and other matters relating to cattle, are of 
BO much interest, that our readers, we doubt not, 
will thank us for the following notices concerning 
them. 
The first epidemic disorder among the cattle to 
which we shall allude, is one which made its appear- 
ance at Groningen and its neighbourhood in 1768. 
The visitation proved most disastrous, especially in 
those rural districts where the inhabitants depended 
almost wholly on the prosperity of their flocks. In 
some villages it left not a solitary individual of the race 
behind ; so that we need not wonder that it excited 
the most general attention, and created no small panic. 
In West Friesland, the province in which Groningen 
is situated, it attacked, according to tables published 
by order of the Elats de Holland, within the period 
of six months, upwards of G^jOGO head, in East 
Friesland 68,000, whilst in Holland proper the num- 
ber exceeded 153,000: in the three provinces toge- 
ther, the number attacked amounted to 286,647, of 
which 208,354 died within six months ! 
Under these circumstances, many of tlie inhabi- 
tants of the country, as well as the magistrates of 
the capital, applied to Camper, and consulted him 
on the best mode of combating, and, if possible, of 
extirpating this disorder. This was a sufficient sti- 
mulus to his zeal, and, availing himself of the occa- 
sion, he endeavoured, in a variety of ways, to serve 
his countrymen. He determijied to gratify their 
