these circumstances, must inevitably follow.* The second visitation of the sweating sickness took place in 1506, which year was preceded by the wet summer of 1505, followed by a severe winter." : In 1510 the Influenza broke out, which, according to Dr. Short, had for its precursor "a long moist air." The appearance of this epidemic in 1557† was after the prevalence of continued wet weather, of which the same author writes:"1557. This year and last was a great scarcity of corn from the past great rains. It was a very unseasonable year in England: all the corn was choked and blasted, the harvest excessively wet and rainy." There were also ill-smelling fogs at the time. In short, to quote the summary of Dr. Theophilus Thompson's compilation from the authors on Epidemical Catarrh, we find that the visitation of 1580 commenced in October, after a cold dry wind preceded by two or three years of "a moist, rainy, southerly constitution." 66 That of 1675, after a pungent fog and cold moist weather. In 1710 the Influenza reappeared, during a moist southerly constitution." In 1729, "after a rainy November with high tides." In 1732-3, "during a damp chilly spring, southerly, and fetid fog." In 1737-8, the influenza commenced in November, when, "a southerly wind indeed damped the month." Huxham says, In 1743, "during the three months preceding the attack of influenza, the atmosphere was for the most part moist and damp, and a stinking fog in January." Dr. Millar observed, with regard to the epidemic of 1758, that "October was very cold and moist, and that a great quantity of rain fell." In 1762, Dr. Pretty observed that after the drought there were "great gluts of rain." The influenza of 1775 "prevailed during a wet autumn." In 1782 it appeared after the summer *Op. cit. p. 187. The year in which Calais was taken by the French. in 1781 having been very dry, the autumn very rainy, the spring of 1782 remarkably late, then gloomy, cold and humid, with occasional dry fogs and peculiar storms." During the epidemic of 1803, the three months February, March, and April, were for the most part cloudy, showery, foggy, and rainy. The epidemic of 1836-7 succeeded disastrous gales, the drifting of the snow, and the floods by the thaw. The year 1836 was remarkable for the number of days in which the south-west wind blew. The mean for the seventeen years from 1826 to 1842 inclusive was found by Daniell* to be 79-8 days, whereas, during this year, the number of days in which this wind prevailed was 126. The amount of rain for the same year was also above the average (24·16 inches); the quantity that fell at Chiswick when the observations were made being 28.73. In the following year, however, the rain was not so abundant, 19.88 inches only being registered: but the wind which prevailed was the south-west. From the above facts the reader will be able to draw his own inferences; and I think he will be satisfied that a southerly wind does seem to merit a great deal of the odium that the antient writers used to attach to it. The necessity of observing the constitution of previous years and seasons was well appreciated by the older physicians, who, from their more intimate acquaintance with the writings of the Fathers of Medicine, were led to adopt the judicious mode of observation which the writings of Hippocrates prove that he adopted. Celsus wrote thus with regard to the weather of foregoing days: "Neque solum interest, quales dies sint, sed etiam quales antececesserint." The aphorism would hold equally good if we substitute anni for dies. The prevalence of the south-east wind was observed to be particularly favourable to the increase of Cholera and Influenza; and Dr. C. J. B. Williams‡ cannot * Meteorological Essays, vol. ii. p. 339. + Celsi Med. lib. ii. cap. i. p. 36, Milligan. Princip. Med. and Pract. of Medicine, p. 42, foot-note. but think that this had some connection with the general tendency exhibited by the former to spread chiefly from east to west. He asks this question: "Has the morbific property of this wind aught to do with the haziness of air when it prevails,-a haziness seen in the country remote from smoke, and quite distinct from fog? What is this haze? In the West of England a hazy day in spring is called a blight." During the cholera epidemic of 1854, the south-westerly winds and calms prevailed, as will be seen from the following analysis. From the 28th week of the year (ending July 15th) to the 49th (ending December 9th) the deaths from cholera rose from five in the week until they amounted to the maximum during the 36th, after which they gradually declined until they again were reduced to five in the 49th week: within this period 22 weeks are included, during fourteen of which the south-west prevailed: the remainder were characterised thus:-one, east-north-east; one, north-west and south-west; two, north-east; three, variable; and one, north-east and south-west. Out of these twenty-two weeks, there were twelve in which calms prevailed, and during many the rest there were several calm nights and days. of The Calm that prevailed throughout this pestilential constitution is another characteristic: άπνοια διὰ τέλεος—there was a calm throughout observed Hippocrates. This absence of wind has been observed during the prevalence of cholera. Mr. Hingeston, in his highly interesting papers, in the Association Medical Journal, lays stress upon the fatal calm that reigned during the visitation of the cholera in 1832. Conjoined with this fearful atmospheric stillness was that seemingly interminable moistness that was suspended for such a length of time over our ill-fated island. Even the most indifferent observer could not help remarking how gloomy and cloudy the weather was, a state of the air that was either associated with or dependent upon the calm. Hippocrates observed the same phenomena, and noted them down in his description of this pestilential year (φθννόπωρον σκιῶδες, ἐπινέφελον). Amongst many other remarks, Mr. Hingeston observed that in 1832 the weather was gloomy and cloudy, and during the cholera of 1854 that the barometer was high and the sky overcast: "a calm prevailed." In 1849 he says that "there were sixty misty days between 1st of January and 31st of August, i. e. one-fourth of the whole;" and from his observations made in 1854 at Newcastle, he found that "the cholera was the worst when the barometer was highest and the atmosphere calmest. There was on this occasion, as on former ones, a certain grey mist, which painters express by the word scumbling; and although it is remarkable that the atmosphere is, during the prevalence of cholera, at once both calm and overcast, and the roads dry if not dusty, yet there is a sticky moisture that pervades everything." In the Association Journal of 1854 (p. 1016) the following remarks were published by the gentleman whom I have just quoted :-" The calm that prevailed throughout the worst period of the disease (cholera) is denoted by the figures in columns nineteen to twenty-two in the Meteorological Observations of the Royal Observatory; on reference to which it will be seen that in the second week of September, when cholera was at its worst, it was represented by 195; whereas in the last week of August it had been 835, and in the fourth week of September, when cholera was slowly retreating from London,' it rose to 1045. The calm that was the greatest was the worst ; and the disease began to decline as the wind rose. If we examine the columns denoting the pressure of the wind in lbs. on the square foot, we shall find that between August 19th and October 21st it was, with very few exceptions, at zero. In the same space of time there were thirty-two days marked as calm, which means that it was absolutely so; but if, according to my own. careful observations, we were to double that number, we should scarcely be wrong in the general acceptation of the word; that is, nearly the whole period was a calm, or at the most only a light breeze. The exceptions to this oppressive state of the atmosphere were October 20th, 19th, and 18th, the 8th, 7th, 5th, and 4th; September 23rd, when the cholera began to decline, the 20th, 19th, and 16th, when there were some stiff breezes from the south-west. Except these days, amounting in all to not more than ten, all the rest of the time has been a calm, frequently a dead calm, with what sailors call cat's paws along the surface of the stagnant ocean." The peculiar gloominess and calm state of the atmosphere I observed at Bridgewater in 1849, when that town was visited by the cholera. Homer, in his short account of the plague with which Apollo afflicted the Greeks, in answer to the prayer of his priest Chryses, remarks that it was ushered in by a gloominess resembling night : ὁ δ ̓ ἦτε νυκτὶ ἐοικώς (Il. i. v. 47). Breathing revenge, a sudden night he spread In the above remarks, mention has been made of stinking fogs as coincident with several epidemics; and although it will not do for me to enter fully upon this subject, inasmuch as it does not strictly belong to our text, yet in connection with it we may remark that certain epidemics have been supposed to have had a peculiar scent belonging to them. Lord Bacon, for instance, states that "the plague has the scent of the smell of a mellow apple." Dr. Copland, as quoted by Dr. Williams,* relates that three persons were struck dead by the smell of the blood during the plague. When the cholera raged at Bridgewater in 1849, I myself could smell, on coming into the town from the country, a peculiar sickly odour; and I found that it was always more powerful in those districts of the town where the epidemic raged most; and it was often, to my sense at least, almost intolerably strong where three or four cases were huddled together to die in one room. As the disease shifted from one quarter of the town to another, I often observed the presence or the absence of this sickening effluvium. Moreover, on being called to a patient suddenly, and of whose disease I had not been apprised by the messenger, on entering the room, and * Op. cit. p. 122. K |