Annals of influenza, or, Epidemic catarrhal fever in Great Britain from 1510 to 1837 / prepared and edited by Theophilus Thompson.

Date:
1852
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annals of influenza, or, Epidemic catarrhal fever in Great Britain from 1510 to 1837 / prepared and edited by Theophilus Thompson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by King’s College London. The original may be consulted at King’s College London.

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    yet, through the small crevices, they admit the air to be strained, which becomes somewhat more pestilent by staying there a long time. The streets, too, are, generally covered with clay and rushes, which are so seldom renewed, that the cover- ing sometimes remains twenty years, concealing beneath a mass of all descriptions of filth, not fit to mention. Hence, upon a change in the atmosphere, a certain vapour is exhaled, in my opinion, not at all wholesome for the human body. Added to this, England is not only surrounded by the sea on every side, hut it is also, in many places, marshy, and inter- sected by salt streams, to say nothing at present of the salt food, of which the common people are amazingly fond. “ It is my firm opinion, that the island would become much more wholesome, if the spreading of rushes on the ground were not used, and if the chambers were so built as to be ex- posed to the Heavens on two or three sides, the windows of glass being so made as to open altogether, and close in the same way, and to shut so as not to admit noxious winds through the crevices. Since, as it is sometimes wholesome to admit the air, so it is sometimes as much so to keep it out. The common people laugh, if a person complain of the cloudy sky. If, even twenty years ago, I had entered into a chamber which had been uninhabited for some months, I was imme- diately seized with a fever. It would contribute to this object (to render the island more healthy), if more sparing diet could be more generally recommended, and a more moderate use of salt provisions; and if certain public officers were commis- sioned to keep the roads more free from nuisances. Those parts, too, should be looked to more particularly, which are in the neighbourhood of a town. You will laugh at my having time to trouble myself about these matters. I love the country which has for so long a time given me an hospitable abode, and in it, should circumstances allow, I would willingly spend what remains of life. “ I have no doubt from your character for wisdom, that you know these matters better than myself; I resolved, how- ever, to mention them to you, that you may, if my opinion coincides with yours, recommend these hints to the notice of the great. Eor, in former days, kings were wont to interest themselves in such things,” &c. &c.]