AN INQUIRY. 
53 
for both of these maladies existed and were abundantly recog¬ 
nized in Britain long before the date of the introduction of 
syphilis. 
III. When the disease first broke out it was regarded by the 
physicians and the public as communicable, and constantly com¬ 
municated from the infected to the healthy by the employment 
of the clothes, vessels, baths, etc., used by those suffering from 
it, and by the slightest contact, or even breathing the same air 
with them, etc. For many years after its outbreak , sexual inter¬ 
course does not appear to have been suspected as the mode of its 
propagation ; the primary affections of the sexual organs were 
not noticed as constant symptoms. [Italics are my own.—R.] 
Their attention was chiefly directed to the secondary symptoms, 
such as the hideous eruptions on the skin, ulcers of the throat, 
the exostoses and nocturnal pains in the bones, etc. 
“ The rapidity with which it spread over Europe led men to 
suppose that it travelled as an epidemic, without waiting for the 
slow process of communication by contact.”—[Theory and Prac¬ 
tice, Yol. II, p. 300.] 
Mr. JDruitt but repeats in substance the same thing: u On 
the other hand,” he continues, “ the opponents of its antiquity 
contend that, although ulcers or pustules in the genital organs 
and sundry discharges were not unknown, still, that neither in 
Celsus, nor in any other ancient writer, do we find mention that 
such maladies were solely the product of sexual commerce, or 
that they were particularly difficult to heal; or that they were 
frequently, or indeed ever followed by constitutional diseases .” 
“ But the most potent argument of all is this, viz.: that all at 
once, towards the close of the fifteenth century, whilst the 
French army was besieging Naples, a new and terrible disease 
sprung up, rebellious to every known method of treatment, 
attacking high and low, rich and poor, sparing neither age nor 
sex, consisting of ulcers on the parts of generation in both sexes, 
which were speedily followed by affections of the throat and nose ; 
by corroding ulcers over the whole body ; by excruciating noc¬ 
turnal pains, and frequently by death. Whereas, not one word 
that can be construed into any similar affection is to be met with 
