It seems not improper likewise to mention the following case; which, if the whole truth is not related, may possibly afford matter of cavil against inoculation.
A short, thick-set, middle-aged man was seized with the usual symptoms on the eighth day after inoculation. The eruption was favourable, the crop moderate, the pustules large and distinct, and no peculiar care was either required or observed. The pock maturated in seven days; after which he took two purges, and had fixed the day for his return to London.
Two days before his intended journey I found him in the morning sitting by the fire, with his hand upon his head. Upon inquiring the reason, he answered, My head feels very queer to-day: a person in company added, that he had made too free with mutton the day before: but this he denied. He did not however seem much indisposed; he had taken a purge, and I expected he would be relieved by its operation.
Next morning he told me he had had a good night’s sleep, and was perfectly well; nevertheless, two hours after he fell down suddenly in a fit, and senseless. In this condition I found him about six in the evening, and so he continued till the night of the following day, when he expired, perfectly apoplectic, in spite of every means we could attempt for his relief.
CASES of the natural Small-pox, treated in the preceding Method.
CASE XXIII.
One morning about ten I was desired to visit a poor man in a fever. Two days before, in the evening, he had been seized with a shivering fit, which was then supposed to be the ague; he soon grew extremely hot, with pain in his head, back, and loins, which continued till I saw him, the 24th of October: he had kept his bed, had scarce any sleep, his heat great, pulse strong and quick, and the pain in his loins very severe. This man had applied to me to be inoculated a little before he was taken ill, on account of the small-pox being very much in his neighbourhood; but he had not as yet taken any preparatory steps. I made no doubt but he was now attacked with this disease, and from the severity of the symptoms expected it would prove of the confluent kind. As he lived near me, and I could easily attend to every circumstance, I determined to try how far the cooling method might be beneficial in treating the natural small-pox.
I found it very difficult to persuade him to rise out of bed, as he thought himself utterly unable to support himself, notwithstanding he was on other occasions a resolute man. Assuring him however that I would not attend him, unless he would comply, he promised to use his utmost endeavours. I left him to put this advice in practice, and ordered him to a carpenter’s yard about one hundred yards distance, where I promised to meet him.