Travels in Turkey, Asia Minor, Syria, and across the desert into Egypt ...

OF PLAGUE. 387
where it first broke out, or becoming otherwise diffusedj and
spreading like wild-tire through villages, towns, and districts,
sweeping off the inhabitants in its progress.
It has been known to
rage ratably at Boulack, and disappear without entering Grand Cairo,
although a distance of only two miles. Such is the extraor-
dinary nature of this disease, that it seems to defy all reasoning.
One would naturally imagine that the mode in which the poorer
classes of people who inhabit Cairo and other towns and villages
in Egypt, &c. are crowded together, would inevitably be productive
of some disease, particularly in so warm a climate, one inha-
bitant of London appearing on an average to occupy as much space
as in twenty Grand Cairo.
The neglect of cleanliness in the inhabitants, who live in filthy
and confined holes, upon a poor diet, with a want of proper and
necessary clothing, must co-operate in the generation of malignant
diseases. Again, I have remarked, that when the Nile is low, the
canal which runs through and about Grand Cairo, is no longer
and the
supplied with fresh waters, its contents becoming stagnant,
receptacle for much filth and corruption, such as the carcasses of
dead dogs, cats, &c. and the refuse of much animal and vegetable
matter. Indeed, the putrid exhalations
issuing from this and other
canals in and about Cairo, I was witness to in 1801, and cannot
help thinking
that those who are situated near them must feel its
baneful effects. However, I content myself to relate the fact,
without hazarding a further opinion.
It has been disputed whether plague is native of Turkey, of
Egypt, or of Africa. To decide may be difficult. It however
may be worthy of remark, that since the interruption of trade between
Egypt and Constantinople during the war, the latter place
has been nearly free from plague.
The climate and air of Turkey appear to be good. At Constan-
tinople the inhabitants are not subject to the hot scorching kampsin
winds, so distressing in Egypt.
It is a well known fact, that the plague disappears suddenly, and
as suddenly re-appears, without affording any apparent cause for
tiiese changes. This happened while we were in
Syria, &c. with
the Ottoman army.
From all that one has seen and heard, it would appear either
that the virus of plague does not always possess the same activity
and force, or that certain persons are occasionally insusceptible of
its action: and also, that from the sudden appearance as well as