Were it not here that we study all possible Brevity, many other Symptoms might be enumerated which commonly attended this pestilential Fever, as Heat of
the Præcordia, Hiccup, Gripings, &c. all which I at present pass by, and close the whole with such as are more peculiar to it, particularly those poisonous Vesications commonly called Blains.
THESE Vesications used commonly to rise with an exquisite and shooting Pain, containing a serous Humour or Ichor, for the most part of a Yellowish or Straw Colour, and encompassed with a variegated Circle, generally Reddish.
THESE Pustules broke out in many Parts of the Body; and as their Station was various, so their Number was also uncertain; in some they were few, in others many, and a Woman I once met with covered all over with them; as to their Bigness, they were also uncertain; for some were as a small Pea, while others increased to the Magnitude of a Nutmeg.
THE included Matter (near perhaps to the Nature of Urine) was altogether incapable of Suppuration, as it was saline and almost caustick; for very soon after its Eruption it would corrode its Vesicle, and
burst out, of a Colour yellowish, livid, or black. Moreover, the surrounding Circle was not always of the same Appearance, although at first coming out it was continually inflamed.
BUT this is highly observable, that sometimes these Vesicles broke out without any other previous Indications of Infection, and, as I imagine, from the expeditious Separation of the pestilential Venom, and the sudden Conquest of the Distemper by a strong Constitution: But whensoever the Pain and Heat of the Part was so aggravated, that no proper Applications would asswage it, there was commonly Danger of a Mortification from so great a Concourse of pestilential Particles together; and once I remember a Vesicle to change into a Carbuncle, from the continued Accession to it of fresh morbifick Poison.
WE come now in Course to speak of Buboes, which were hard and painful Tumours, with Inflammation and Gathering upon the Glands, behind the Ears, Arm-Pits, or Groin.
THESE Tumors immediately upon Seizure are found so hard, that they will not at all give Way to the Touch. In some these were moveable, and in others fixed; but after some Time this great Tension remitted; and it was common to prognosticate the Event of the Distemper from their sudden or slow Increase, and from their genuine or untoward Suppuration, as also from the Degrees of Virulence in their Contents.
THE Groans and unfeigned Tears of the Sick too plainly expressed the Aggravations of their Miseries, and some seemed even to drown their Sense of Pain with their Complainings; and this Intenseness of Pain cannot be a Wonder to any, who duly consider either the Nature of the pestilential Venom, or the Constitution of the Glands. I have already so largely discoursed of the Virulence and corrosive Qualities of the pestilential Poison, that no more need here be said about it; and whosoever examines the Glands will find, that from the great Distention of the Vessels, in this Case, the Buboes must chiefly owe their Rise to a Correspondence between