“At the Bear-garden at Hockley-in-the-Hole, at the request of several persons of quality, on Monday the 4th of this instant of June, is one of the largest and most mischievous bears that ever was seen in England to be baited to death, with other variety of bull-baiting, and bear-baiting; as also a wild bull to be turned loose in the Game Place, with fireworks all over him. To begin exactly at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, because the sport continues long.” Close by, in Spa Fields, female prize fights were held, and there is a lively account of one of these encounters in which “Bruising Peg” terribly damaged her antagonist. In such a time, of course, foot-pads abounded, and it was not without danger that persons crossed Spa Fields after dark; and those who were invited to Sadler’s Wells, to see a man eat a live cock, feathers and all, for a wager of £5, were informed that the New Road and City Road would be patrolled, and that the return home would be without danger. Such facts as these, which I could multiply to any extent, show the rough moral condition of the populace, and I believe that, with such a state of moral feeling, any real improvement in public health was impossible. Another cause of the high death-rate was superstition, which regarded disease as a “visitation” which had to be borne without question or inquiry. With such an attitude towards epidemics, which by some were regarded as due to an unfortunate conjunction of certain planets, it is not to be wondered at that the epidemics were mismanaged; and it is certainly difficult to imagine any measure better calculated to cause the spread of the plague than that of forbidding those affected to leave their houses, and compelling them to stay indoors and infect the rest of the household. The most efficient of all measures which we nowadays adopt for preserving the public health is that of the instant separation of the sick from among the healthy, a plan which had been adopted in old time in the case of “leprosy,” and which we re-introduced in the last century, when the first small-pox hospital was built. Another great cause of the high mortality was the ignorance of the physicians, who were almost as superstitious as the populace, and who were entirely without any exact or correct knowledge of their art, which they practised almost entirely by the light of the old Greek, Roman, and Arabian writers. To recapitulate, the causes of the high death-rate were probably the following:-- 1. The prevalence of ague from the abundant marshes. 2. The dirt of the city and the houses, and the probable infection of wells from a soil sodden with putrefactive matter. 3. The ill-nourished, drunken, and scorbutic condition of the people, and 4. Their condition of superstition and brutality, which made any rules for public health impossible. 5. The neglect to separate the infected from the healthy. 6. The ignorance of the doctors.