[An extract from the _Adagia_, no. 796. The Dutch physician referred to
is perhaps a Dr. Bont whom Erasmus knew at Cambridge in 1511 and who died
there of the plague in 1513.]
9, 10. QUID MULTIS] Cf. IX. 219 n.
10. GERMANO] Their standards of honesty were then high, and they were in
consequence apt to be imposed upon. England on the contrary was already
'perfide Albion'; as Erasmus writes in a letter of 1521, 'Britannia vulgo
male audit, quoties de fide agitur'.
24. _tuissare_: to address as 'thou'. Cf. Fr. tutoyer, Germ. dutzen.
33. QUAE NULLA] a condensed expression equivalent to _quae, quamvis
maxima, non tamen_.
XXVIII
[A letter written to John Francis, physician to Wolsey, and one of the
promoters of the College of Physicians in 1518. The date of the letter is
uncertain.]
3. SUDORE LETALI] The sweating-sickness. Ammonius (see XV introd.) fell a
victim to it in 1517.
8. HABENT] _sc_. Angli.
10. Claudius Galenus (130-200) was a Greek physician, who practised at
Rome in the reign of Marcus Aurelius.
13. COLATAM] a medical technical term (cf. XXIX. 10); lit. 'filtered'. So
here 'fine draughts' of air coming in round the small window panes.
Erasmus' idea seems to have been that when the winds were blowing, the
air would be fresh and the windows should be opened; but that when the
air was still, it was likely to be unwholesome and should be kept out.
24. SALSAMENTIS] Much of the leprosy which was prevalent at the time has
been ascribed to the consumption of salt fish.
35. CONFERRET] 'It would be useful'; cf. _conducere_.
40. OTIUM MEUM] 'at my spending my time in this way.'
XXIX
[This extract from a letter written to Fisher in 1524 contributes
something to the description of English houses given in XXVIII. Erasmus
had sent one of his servants to England, earlier in the summer, with
letters announcing that he was composing a book against Luther--as his
friends had frequently urged him to do.]
6. MARE] Erasmus had visited Fisher at Rochester in 1516 and clearly had
vivid recollections of the mud-flats of the Medway.
9. PARIETIBUS VITREIS] i.e. with continuous windows, as in the stern
galleries of old sailing ships.
* * * * *
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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