I prescribed for the young man, as well as I could; but it was all to no purpose. Some unknown influence, local or general, seemed to hang like an incubus about him, and to depress, in particular, his nervous system. In short, the symptoms were such as portended swift destruction, if not immediate. I could but predict the worst. And the worst soon came. He sunk, in a few days, to an untimely grave. I say _untimely_ with peculiar emphasis; for he had hitherto been regarded as particularly robust and healthy. His remains were scarcely entombed when several members of his father's family were attacked in a similar way. Another young man in the neighborhood, who had been employed at the same place with the deceased, and who had returned at the same time, also sickened, and with nearly the same symptoms. And then, in a few days more, the father and mother of the latter began to droop, and to fall into the same train of diseased tendencies with the rest. Of these, too, I had the charge. My hands were now fully occupied, and so was my head. Anxious as most young men are, in similar circumstances, not only to save their patients, but their reputation, and though the distance at which they resided was considerable, I visited both families twice a day, and usually remained with one of them during the night. I was afraid to trust them with others. Physically this constant charge was too much for me, and ought not to have been attempted. No physician should watch with his patients, by night or by day,--above all by night--any more than a general should place himself in the front of his army, during the heat of battle. His life is too precious to be jeoparded beyond the necessities involved in his profession. But while my hands were occupied, my mind was racked exceedingly with constant inquiry into the cause of this terrible disease,--for such to my apprehension it was becoming. The whole neighborhood was alarmed, and the paleness of death was upon almost every countenance. My doubts were at length removed, and the cause of trouble, as I then supposed and still believe, fully revealed. The disease so putrescent in its tendencies, had originated in animal putrefaction. The circumstances were as follows:-- The individual with whom the young men who sickened had been residing and laboring, had laid aside, in his chamber, some time before, quite a pile of lambskins, just in the condition in which they were when removed from their natural owners, and had suffered them to lie in that condition until they were actually putrescent and highly offensive. The two young men, owing to the relative position of the chambers they occupied, were particularly exposed to the poisonous effluvia.