Having got so far, we come next to a region of almost inextricable confusion, a region of secrecy and mystification, as well as of real contemporary ignorance. We may best approach it by one or two passages from Gilbert and Gordonio themselves. The systematic handling of _lepra_ in their writings is one thing, and their more concrete remarks on its conditions of origin, its occasions, or circumstances are another. What are we to make of this kind of leprosy?--“In hoc genere, causa est accessus ad mulierem ad quam accessit prius leprosus; et corrumpit velocius vir sanus quam mulier a leproso.... Et penetrant [venena] in nervos calidos et arterias et venas viriles, et inficiunt spiritus et bubones, et hoc velocius si mulier,” etc. Or to quote Gilbert again: “Ex accessu ad mulieres, diximus superius, lepram in plerisque generari post coitûs leprosos[138].” Or in Gordonio: “Et provenit [lepra] etiam ex nimia confibulatione cum leprosis, et ex coitu cum leprosa, et qui jacuit cum muliere cum qua jacuit leprosus[139].” That these circumstances of contracting _lepra_ were not mere verbal theorizings inspired by the pathology of the day and capable of being now set aside, is obvious from a _historia_ or case which Gordonio introduces into his text. “I shall tell what happened,” he says; and then proceeds to the following relation:[140] “Quaedam comtissa venit leprosa ad Montem Pessulanum [Montpellier], et erat in fine in cura mea; et quidam Baccalarius in medicina ministrabat ei, et jacuit cum ea, et impregnavit eam, et perfectissime leprosus factus est.” Happy is he therefore, he adds, who learns caution from the risks of others.