407 
distribution of yaws, it is unlikely that the European countries could 
have escaped infection until modern times. The forefathers of the 
Caucasic peoples must have been already infected before they left 
the race-home on the pleistocene plateau of Sahara. 
The experiments of Metchnikoff and Roux have shown that apes 
can be inoculated with syphilis. The femur of Pithecanthropus 
erectus shows evidences of disease very suggestive of syphilis. I am 
aware that these have been attributed to myositis ossificans, but one 
would think that the latter is more likely to be a recent disease 
resulting from the artificial circumstances of human life. In the 
Chaldean epic of Izduhar or Gilgames, it is told how the demi-god, 
having incurred the anger of Istar, was afflicted with a plague. An 
eruption of sores covered his body, his bones ached, his strength 
waned, his hair fell out. At length, under the advice of his beatified 
ancestor, Hasisadra, he was restored to health by sea-bathing. 
George Smith and other translators of the cuneiform script, following 
him, have read this to be leprosy. But every eruption on the skin is 
loosely so called by those writing on ancient matters. The leprosy 
of the Levitical regulations (Lev., chapters 13 and 14) was certainly 
not lepra. It no doubt included more than one disease, but most 
likely it referred chiefly to yaws. I here is, perhaps, a reference to 
psoriasis in the “ bright spots," and to frambesia in the appearance of 
the raw quick flesh. The disease was one of rapid development, for 
a suspect was kept under observation for seven days, and then foi 
seven days more. Provision is made for restoring the outcast patient 
to society when he became clean. 1 his would have been useless in 
the case of leprosy. The suggestion that Leviticus refers to yaws is 
a very old one, and has been discussed unfavourably by Alford 
Nicholls. But there is no common disease except syphilis which 
would explain all the regulations. True leprosy, no doubt, came 
under the operation of the laws, and was dealt with along with the 
syphilis. 
It may be claimed that the symptoms of syphilis were sufficiently 
"ell known to find a place in the folklore of the early Semitic tribes, 
an d to be subsequently included by the compilers of the traditional 
history and the authors of the great poems; and it was found 
Pessary to devise an elaborate legislation to prevent its spread. 
T he epic of Gilgames cannot be dated earlier than the second 
