A HISTORY OF EPIDEMIC PESTILENCES FROM THE EARLIEST AGES, 1495 Years before the Birth of our Saviour to 1848: WITH RESEARCHES INTO THEIR NATURE, CAUSES, AND PROPHYLAXIS. BY EDWARD BASCOME, M.D. “The all-surrounding heav’n, the vital air, Is big with death: and tho’ the putrid south Be shut, tho’ no convulsive agony Shake from the deep foundations of the world Th’ imprison’d plagues, a secret venom oft Corrupts the air, the water, and the land.” ART OF PRESERVING HEALTH. LONDON: JOHN CHURCHILL, PRINCES STREET, SOHO. 1851. HUGHES AND CO., PRINTERS, KING’S HEAD COURT, GOUGH SQUARE. DEDICATION. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY, AND TO DR. JOHN CONOLLY, M.D. MY LORD, MY DEAR SIR, Inadequate as I feel to the task of conveying to you my sense of obligation in being permitted the honour of dedicating this work to persons of your high position and distinguished merit, I feel doubly so, to express my admiration of your _immeasurable benevolence_, as portrayed not only in your public capacities in general, but more especially--the one in emanating, the other in carrying out the provisions of the law for the protection and kind consideration of those unfortunates of God’s creatures whom it hath pleased him to afflict with the direst of human maladies, the privation or prostration of the noblest of man’s faculties--Reason. That your labours have been of incalculable benefit to suffering humanity is too notorious to admit of either comment or eulogy from me. That you both may live long in health, to see perfected “the good work begun” by you, and that you may enjoy the satisfaction of a well-earned reputation resulting therefrom, is the earnest wish of, My Lord, and My dear Sir, With the highest respect, Your obedient, Humble Servant, THE AUTHOR. PREFACE. Feeling it to be incumbent on every one to contribute to the good of his fellow-men, in as far as his experience enables him-- “Non sibi sed toti mundo se credere natum;”