This plague is said to have arisen from a box of clothes sent from London while the distemper was at its height in that city. But whether this be admitted or not, it cannot well be supposed that in a small village there could either be a peculiar constitution of the air, collections of filth, immoderate heat, cold, or in short any general cause from which a plague could be supposed to arise, that would not have affected the country for a great way round. How then came this insulated spot to be so violently affected, except by contagion? No matter whether by clothes or any thing else. The very particular manner in which the numbers who died are recorded, leaves no doubt as to the fact of the distemper having been there; neither is it possible to account for its rise on any other principle than contagion. Mr. Howard, previous to his going abroad, had been furnished, by Dr. Aikin and Dr. Jebb, with a set of queries relative to the plague, to be put to the physicians in the different countries through which he travelled. This commission he executed with great fidelity and exactness. The physicians to whom he proposed them were, _Raymond_ of Marseilles, physician; _Demollins_ of do. surgeon; _Giovanelli_, physician to the lazaretto at Leghorn; _They_, to do. at Malta; _Morandi_, physician at Venice; _Verdoni_, at Trieste; _Jew_ physician at Smyrna; _Fra. Luigi di Pavia_, prior to the hospital of San Antonio at Smyrna. The questions proposed were as follow: 1. Is the infection of the plague frequently received by the French? Though this was not asking in direct terms whether the plague is infectious or not, all to whom it was proposed seem to have viewed it in this light, Raymond of Marseilles only excepted, who answered directly, “Sometimes it is.” All the rest, except Giovanelli, agreed that it might be communicated by the touch, or by the breath. Verdoni gave an instance of its being communicated by a flower which three persons smelt at; two remained free, but the third sickened and died in twenty-four hours. 2. Does the plague ever rise spontaneously? In this Verdoni alone answered positively in favour of the spontaneous rise of the plague. _They_ spoke ambiguously. 3. To what distance is the air infected? How far does actual contact, wearing infected clothes, or touching other things, produce the disease?