-----------------------+-------+-------+-------+------+-----_A Comparative View of the Mortality of the Human Species, at All Ages And of the Diseases and Casualties by Which They Are Destroyed or Annoyed. Illustrated With Charts and Tables

| Years,| 1717 | 1732 | 1747 | 1762 | Amount of

| from | to | to | to | to |Seventy-five

DISEASES | 1701 | 1732.| 1747.| 1762.| 1777.| Years

AND | to | | | | | Mortality,

| | | | | | to 1777.

-----------------------+-------+-------+-------+------+------+------------

Ague | 80| 198| 82| 99| 109| 574

| | | | | |

and Purple | 50,955| 53,330| 57,995|45,621|48,594| 256,085

| | | | | |

Small Pox | 22,219| 34,448| 29,462|29,165|36,276| 151,570

Measles | 1,972| 2,618| 2,858| 3,099| 3,319| 13,866

Quincy, Sore Throat | 226| 169| 287| 306| 309| 1,297

Pleurisy | 384| 602| 811| 407| 321| 3,525

Rheumatism | 368| 447| 310| 175| 128| 1,468

Gout | 313| 645| 769| 803| 1,010| 3,236

| | | | | |

Consumption | 42,541| 49,680| 66,009|61,749|68,949| 288,928

Cough, Cough | 116| 632| 1,692| 2,755| 4,252| 9,573

Asthma and Tissick | 5,090| 7,938| 9,460| 5,699| 6,154| 34,341

| | | | | |

Apoplexy and Suddenly | 2,228| 3,013| 3,287| 3,271| 3,353| 15,152

Palsy | 332| 550| 621| 1,021| 1,020| 3,544

Lethargy | 105| 126| 116| 105| 74| 526

Meagrims | 13| 10| -- | -- | -- | 23

Headach | 21| 32| 6| 18| -- | 77

Lunatick | 412| 513| 777| 1,126| 1,048| 3,876

Spleen and Vapours | 53| 52| 20| -- | -- | 125

Rising of the Lights | 1,219| 1,239| 197| 30| 10| 2,074

| | | | | |

Stoppage of the Stomach| 4,139| 2,557| 2,286| 304| 179| 9,465

Vomiting and Looseness | 820| 682| 248| 134| 120| 2,004

Twisting of the Guts | 13,668| 11,032| 3,739| 1,475| 796| 29,710

Flux | 178| 200| -- | 252| 341| 971

Bloody Flux | 133| 248| 167| 94| 93| 745

Worms | 697| 662| 161| 115| 56| 1,691

Jaundice | 1,261| 1,798| 2,032| 1,729| 2,089| 8,909

Strangury | 789| 868| 700| 421| 429| 3,205

Diabetes | 37| 48| 19| 16| 5| 125

| | | | | |

Dropsy and Tympany | 11,626| 15,430| 16,036|13,410|14,038| 70,506

Livergrown | 76| 95| 75| 23| -- | 269

| | | | | |

French Pox | 917| 1,372| 1,663| 997| 1,016| 5,965

Scurvy | 63| 28| 14| 59| 42| 226

Evil | 1,020| 519| 426| 197| 198| 2,360

Leprosy | 19| 53| 69| 39| 15| 1,915

Rash | 77| 128| 47| 59| 24| 341

Itch | -- | -- | 42| 31| 11| 84

| | | | | |

Childbed | 3,560| 3,894| 3,412| 3,005| 3,186| 17,057

Abortion, and Stillborn| 8,746| 10,231| 8,793| 8,820|10,241| 46,831

Chrisoms and Infants | 850| 315| 606| -- | -- | 1,771

Miscarriage | -- | -- | 47| 56| 49| 152

| | | | | |

Convulsions | 91,660|114,718|111,966|85,196|89,221| 492,761

Water in the Head | 609| 2,374| 2,013| 1,022| 337| 6,355

Teeth | 18,478| 25,199| 20,274|13,978|11,918| 89,847

Thrush | 839| 1,191| 1,512| 1,391| 1,101| 6,034

Scald Head | 9| 15| 29| 22| -- | 75

Rickets | 3,916| 1,383| 954| 112| 104| 6,569

| | | | | |

Inflammation | 8| 67| 698| 894| 1,394| 3,061

Imposthume | 790| 694| 387| 191| 84| 2,130

St. Anthony’s Fire | -- | 73| 36| 63| 69| 241

Mortification | 1,071| 2,857| 3,362| 3,083| 3,023| 13,438

Canker | 138| 181| 123| 77| 61| 580

Cancer | 1,041| 1,059| 774| 682| 719| 2,475

Sores and Ulcers | 695| 485| 402| 253| 236| 2,071

Fistula | 360| 202| 210| 134| 119| 1,025

Bursten and Ruptures | 310| 309| 304| 163| 140| 1,226

Swelling and Wen | 6| -- | 47| 49| 37| 139

| | | | | |

and other Accidents | 828| 917| 926| 1,084| 1,065| 4,820

Self-Murder | 445| 667| 693| 555| 509| 2,869

Murdered | 135| 109| 147| 71| 77| 539

Wounded, Shot, &c. | 15| 32| 13| -- | -- | 60

| | | | | |

Executed | -- | -- | 495| 495| 1,020|

Drowned | 907| 1,193| 1,444| 1,718| 1,781| 7,043

Burnt | 90| 54| 90| 127| 132| 493

Scalded | 19| 36| 45| 51| 40| 191

and Smothered | 13| 34| 62| 90| 68| 276

Overlaid | 817| 1,180| 1,293| 414| 95| 3,799

Found dead | 388| 557| 668| 336| 133| 2,082

Grief | -- | 267| -- | 87| 77| 421

Frightened | 8| 14| 8| 13| 2| 45

Surfeits | 685| 131| 59| 31| 27| 933

Starved | -- | 17| 96| 53| 57| 223

Excessive Drinking | 19| 267| 678| 189| 69| 1,222

Bleeding | 87| 69| 57| 70| 114| 397

Poisoned | 2| 7| 7| 24| 10| 40

Cats | -- | 3| 14| 15| 6| 38

| | | | | |

Bedridden | -- | 104| -- | 56| 105| 265

Aged | 27,341| 34,708| 30,058|25,109|22,032| 139,248

_A MEDICAL CATALOGUE of all the principal Diseases and Casualties by

which the Human Species are destroyed or annoyed._

FEVERS. Intermittent, quotidian, tertian, quartan, species and

varieties.

—— Remittent, Continued, and Eruptive; remittent, and the species,

nervous and putrid, miliary, inflammatory, small pox natural and

inoculated, measles, scarlet fever, some cutaneous eruptions, mixed

and anomalous fevers, plague, sweating sickness.

FEVERS with topical inflammation of the brain, of the fauces, including

angina inflammatory and putrid, pleurisy, and peripneumony,

inflammations of the heart, diaphragm, liver, spleen, stomach,

intestines, kidneys and ureters, bladder, peritoneum, erysipelas,

acute and chronic rheumatism, regular and irregular gout. Internal

suppuration and gangrene.

Injured respiration and coughs, catarrh, pulmonary hæmorrhage,

pulmonary consumption, hectick, atrophy and tabes, asthma, hooping

cough, croup.

Natal hemorrhage, headach, nightmare, lethargy, vertigo, apoplexy,

epilepsy, fainting, resemblance of death from drowning, foul air,

&c. palpitation of the heart, internal polypus and aneurism,

tetanus and locked jaw, catalepsy, spasm, cramp, Saint Vitus’s

dance, tremor, palsy, berbiers, insanity furious and melancholy,

hypochondriasm.

Diseases of the sight, hearing, smell, taste, voice, and speech,

sterility of the sexes, morbid irritability of the genitals,

diseases of the teeth, deglutition obstructed.

Diseases of the stomach, and of the complex organization, subservient

to appetite and digestion, gall-stones, jaundice, cholera,

dysentery, diarrhœa, cholick, worms, tenesmus, costiveness,

hemorrhage from the stomach and anus.

Morbid symptoms and diseases from various poisons, canine madness,

venomous bites and stings.

Obstruction and suppression of urine, stone in the bladder, diabetes

and incontinence of urine, ulcers of the kidney and bladder, bloody

urine.

Watery effusions, or dropsies of the head, spine, chest, pericardium,

external cellular membrane, abdomen, ovarium, fallopian tubes,

womb, scrotum, tympany, corpulency, and excess of fat.

Venereal disease, scurvy, scrophula, leprosy, yaws, itch; several

chronic cutaneous defedations, morb. pedicul.

FEMALE DISEASES. Obstruct. mens. chlorosis, excessive menstr. fluor

alb. hystericks, pregnancy, parturition, natural, laborious,

preternatural, and complex, some diseases during pregnancy,

abortion and miscarriage, uterine hemorrhage, fainting,

convulsions, lochial excess and suppression, uterine inflammation,

puerperal fever, after-pains, weed, milk fever, inflammation of

the breast, excess and defect of milk.

INFANT DISEASES. Convulsions internal spasms, dentition, rickets,

thrush.

_N. B._ Vomiting, diarrhœa and watery gripes, hectick and atrophy,

small pox, measles, rash, hooping cough and worms, dropsy

of the head and spine, are before described, under their

respective titles.

Internal schirrus affecting various parts, the lungs, stomach,

intestines, liver, spleen, kidneys, ovaria, womb, testicles; also

internal cancer, external scirrhus and cancer.

External inflammation, suppuration, gangrene, burns, wounds, and

contusions, fractures simple and compound, luxations and sprains,

herniæ, or ruptures, abscess and ulcers, white swelling, spina

ventosa, external aneurism and varix, polypus of the nose, fauces,

vagina, womb, wens, bronchocele, corns, warts, chilblains.

An abstract of the general causes of diseases and mortality, of the

seasons and elements, food and drink, excretions and secretions,

exercise and rest, sleep and waking, passions of mind, venery.

An abstract of mortality in various domestic and military hospitals.

The Poet has, in just and emphatical language, stiled health the vital

principle of bliss. In the rude state of science and medicine, and

in the ages of superstition and credulity, it was usual to ascribe

diseases to the immediate resentment of some invisible demon, or to

divine displeasure and chastisement; on which account, in barbarous

nations, their physicians have been a set of stupid conjurors. Two

centuries have barely elapsed, since the people of England could,

with difficulty, be persuaded that the jail distemper, communicated

at the Oxford assizes, from the prisoners to the spectators, was not

kindled up by witchcraft and necromancy: but learning and philosophy

have now discarded such supernatural agents. Others again equally err,

in supposing diseases to be unsteady motions of the human machine,

excited by something hurtful. This popular error seems to originate

from confounding diseases themselves with the versatility of medical

remedies and practice. Beyond a doubt, diseases are presented to us,

over and over again, in nearly the same form and shape: the diseases

delineated two thousand years ago by Hippocrates, at this day retain

the same essential marks and prominent features; tho’ in degree and

violence, there are many gradations and shades to vary the picture.

A disease, in the pathological language, is when one or more of the

various corporeal or mental functions, cannot be performed as in

usual health. The symptoms of all diseases are indicated by few or

many derangements of the corporeal functions, of the excretions, and

of the sensible qualities: such are pain, disagreeable sensation,

anxiety, irritation internal or external; the exercise of some of

the external or internal senses impeded; of sleep and waking; of the

muscular or moving fibres; of the digestive and intestinal functions:

of the lacteal, lymphatic, or absorbent system; of the respiration,

sanguiferous circulation, and arterial pulsation; of the different

excretions and secretions, the feces, urine, perspiration, bile,

pancreatic fluid, saliva, milk, menses, semen, mucus, oil, lymph, by

extravasated blood: by the countenance, actions, gestures, debility,

strength, heat, colour, smell, taste, magnitude, hardness, softness,

the nature and appearance of the excretions, &c. I studiously avoid

all minute pathological discrimination of symptoms; as symptoms of the

disease, of the cause, of symptoms, of reacting nature; of primary,

pathognomic, accidental, and accessary symptoms. Nor in briefly

enumerating the various causes of diseases, shall I waste time in

the explanation of what may be learned from pathological systems and

vocabularies: such as the technical distinction of causes into external

and internal, predisponent, exciting and occasional, remote and

proximate.

There is both fiction and much truth in the warbling melody of the

Roman poet: “Post ignem etherea domo subductum macies, et nova

febrium cohors incubuit terris.” Consumptions and Fevers we see, by

arithmetical demonstration, are amongst the most universal and fatal

maladies of our metropolis and Island. I begin this morbid survey with

the latter. The principal and most general febrile epidemicks which

infested England during two intire centuries, are enumerated in a

short abstract, by Dr. Short; and consist of plagues, agues, remittent

fevers, summer and autumnal dysenteries, spotted putrid fevers, slow

fevers, small pox, measles, putrid and contagious peripneumonies,

fatal spring pleurisies, and peripneumonies, and epidemical catarrhs.

Throughout all countries, in epidemical diseases, there are years

when they are more or less prevalent. Great national calamities, from

this source, are rare: none ever inundate a whole kingdom (catarrh

in some instances excepted): they sometimes indeed spread from one

province to another, but all the community are never attacked at once;

nor are large populous kingdoms, or even cities, totally exempt from

them. Fevers of various generic forms, as intermittent, remittent,

nervous and putrid, scarlet, small-pox, measles, &c. may be local and

circumscribed to one city or district, whilst others in the vicinity,

continue at the same time healthy; the disease dissipating its

virulence within a small boundary. From a comparison of 150 different

parish registers, Dr. Short calculates, that within a certain period,

some have had 8 to 14 sickly years, and others, in the same interval,

only one. He estimates 5, 6, and 8 years interval, as a common rotine

of irruption by some epidemical distemper, even in remote country

parishes: and a few of them have been so fortunate as to escape any

uncommon or remarkable mortality during 11, 12, or even 20 and 30

years. In all the seasons denominated sickly in the country parishes,

the burials exceeded the christenings; and according to the nature of

the epidemick, the morbid state of the seasons, the medical treatment,

and many other circumstances, the gradations of mortality, even by the

same disease, were extremely various.

Collating the annual average of deaths in a sickly year of London, and

other great cities, with sickly years in the country parishes, Dr.

Short found, that cities and towns, in this respect, have the advantage

of the country. In spacious open country districts where fatal

epidemicks burst out, according to this author, more died in one year

than during 6, 10, 12, or sometimes 15 healthy years: whereas, says he,

in London, and such other cities, not above one third, fourth, or fifth

beyond the ordinary consumption are swept away. Pestilential mortality

is a solitary exception to this proportion. In the London bills we

may frequently observe, that in different months, the deaths are

double or treble above equal periods of the same year: but during the

present century, I find no instance of triple, very rarely of double

excess in the annual London burials. Dr. Short adds, that mortality is

more constant and regular in cities, and not so many destroyed “per

saltum” from raging epidemicks, as in the country. In pure open air, he

suggests, that contagion and infection, or other adulterated effluvia,

are more virulent. Or perhaps he should have said, or at least have

added, that in cities where the atmosphere is charged with a load of

smoke, and other heterogeneous vapours, epidemical poisons may be

blunted, decompounded, or annihilated; that likewise in cities, human

bodies are more early seasoned and habituated to such noxious external

impressions, and, like doctors and nurses, are in some degree fortified

by habit: that besides, in every large metropolis, small-pox, measles,

and, some other febrile epidemicks, are almost constant residents; and

consequently the devaluation from these diseases is more regular and

equal than in the country, where several years intervene between their

invasions.

The absolute mortality by fevers in the London bills, without including

the small pox and measles, amounts to nearly one seventh of the whole

funeral catalogue. In the London dispensaries, the Aldersgate and

Westminster, and in the Newcastle hospital, fevers were a fourth

and sixth to all other diseases. De Haen computes, that out of two

thousand sick, admitted into the hospitals in Vienna, seven hundred

of them laboured under acute and febrile diseases. Dr. Cleghorn

estimates the summer fevers in that warm Mediterranean island Minorca,

as constituting three-fourths of all the diseases in that island.

Dr. Lind calculates, that nineteen out of twenty of all the numerous

Europeans who visit the sultry climates of Africa, America, and of the

East and West Indies, are destroyed by intermittent, remittent fevers,

and fluxes; and probably he also should have added, or by chronic

diseases and broken constitutions, the consequence of those fevers.

In the London bills of mortality, many different genera of fevers are

crammed into one indiscriminate heap, from which it is impossible

to extricate the specific nature or genus of febrile carnage. I was

anxious to determine with some probability, the ratio of desolation

in London, by each of the different febrile genera: because it would

be an important guide to the prevention and cure. I knew that most of

our hospital registers were in this particularly defective; on that

account I was favoured by a medical friend, with the perusal of the

books of the Aldersgate dispensary. But although no gentlemen are

better qualified to discriminate diseases, I perceived, on inspection,

that too often the genus of fevers was not marked, only by the general

outlines of the class. However, I converted this scrutiny to some

other use, as will hereafter appear.

We shall first trace the prominent features of the general febrile

Class, descending progressively through the different Orders and

Genera. In most fevers, of whatsoever genus, one or more of the

following symptoms occur: shivering, chilliness, and heat of the skin

alternating: the circulation of the blood, and consequently of the

pulse, as felt at the wrist, accelerated more than in the natural

state; in adults, to upwards of 96 strokes every minute; and in

infants, is considerably more increased in velocity: also general

languor, lassitude, and debility of the nerves and muscles; dryness

of the mouth and tongue, thirst; little or no sleep, or disturbed and

not refreshing, and generally headach: in most of the continued and

remittent fevers, there is total suspension of appetite, sickness at

the stomach, nausea and vomiting; increased heat of the skin, at least

burning sensation; aversion to motion; the sick are mostly confined

to bed, unable to walk, or frequently even to sit erect; and this is

commonly the case, even in the intermittent genera during the febrile

paroxism: the remittent and continued have usually an evening or

nocturnal febrile exacerbation: the voice and countenance frequently

express condolence: and in the genera of topical inflammations, there

is fixed pain in the different parts affected.

_Intermittent Fevers_, or Agues, notwithstanding their febrile type,

fall under the Chronic class. They are usually distinguished into

different genera, or types; into Quotidian, Tertian, Quartan, with

their separate species and varieties. It would seem, by the London

registers, that very few die of agues, from which no age is exempted,

but to which adults are much more obnoxious. Intermittent havock,

if not immediately, yet in its chronic effects, is far more fatal

than the London bills represent. Towns in general, it is true, are

less harrassed with agues than country places. Pringle remarks, that

during the campaigns of the British troops in the marshy countries of

Holland and Flanders, where, in all such climates, and in damp soils

and situations, agues and remittent fevers are epidemick, that the

soldiers quartered in towns were less afflicted than those stationed in

country cantonments: that in the former, the fires, sewers, drains, and

paved streets, prevented an exuberance of moisture: and that, if the

men slept in the upper floors of the house, they were still more secure

from damp and intermittent sickness.

The invasion of Intermittent Paroxisms, is during certain periods

only, and generally consists of a successive series of shivering and

cold, burning heat, and profuse sweats: and exhibits the fundamental

outlines of all fevers. Intermittent paroxisms, and consequently

the genera and species, vary in duration, in recurrence, and in the

symptoms. Quotidians, Tertians, and Quartans, consist of paroxisms,

at the respective intervals of 24, 48, and 72 hours. An interval

denotes the length of time from the beginning of one paroxism to the

next succeeding: an intermission the vacation between paroxisms.

Other distinctions, perhaps too refined, are made of intermittents,

as Quintanæ, Septiminæ, Decimanæ, Erraticæ, Vagæ. Each of the three

primary intermittent genera, are likewise subdivided into duplex and

triplex. The double tertian is a very universal form, but may be

referred to remittents: it implies that every other or second day

the paroxisms are similar, but different in the intermediate days.

Again, the type of intermittents is often obscured under a cloud of

irregular and adventitious symptoms; and from one predominant symptom,

or from similarity to various other diseases, these three fundamental

genera are split by Nosologists into other species and varieties; the

Quotidiana or intermittens, into simplex, cephalalgia, ophthalmica,

nephralgica, stranguriosa, ischiadica, sputatoria, catarrhalis,

anginosa, epileptica, hysterica, partialis: the Tertiana into simplex,

hemitritæa, duplex, triplex, pleuritica, asthmatica, arthritica,

emetica, hysterica, apoplectica, urticata, and other species of

double tertian enumerated under the remittent type: the Quartana into

cataleptica, epileptica, hysterica, maniaca, comatosa, nephralgica,

splenetica, arthritica.

The three stages of intermittent fevers, during their periodical

revolution, affect, more or less, the brain and nerves, the inherent

muscular power, the heart and arteries, the stomach and intestines, and

the sensible qualities of the body; the symptoms usually succeeding

in the following progressive order: languor, sluggishness, debility,

impaired sensibility, sometimes drowsiness and coma, oscitation,

sensation of coldness in the back and spine, overspreading the body

and extremities; accelerated and weak pulse; laborious respiration

with anxiety; impaired appetite, and often sickness, nausea, and

vomiting of bile; thirst; limpid urine; pale face, extremities, and

trunk, and cutaneous collapse; rigor and trembling of the extremities

and trunk, and gnashing of the teeth, as if cold water was poured on

the body. This stage is various in duration in different persons, and

in the different intermittent types. Nature at length rallies its

powers with success, and with the expulsion of the cold, the second

or hot stage is kindled up with undulating flushes of heat, and its

preternatural increase over the body; the cutaneous blood vessels are

dilated with suffusion of the countenance, redness, and burning heat;

the pulse becomes strong, full, and more regular; the respiration

continues oppressed, and is accelerated; with headach, throbbing of

the temporal arteries, and sometimes delirium. After some continuance

of this febrile struggle, and tumultuary rage of the re-acting organs

of sensation and motion, the third stage of sweat is introduced by

some moisture oozing throughout all the cutaneous pores, and poured

out often in profuse streams: with this the heat of the body, the

pulse, respiration and appetite become more natural; the urine less

transparent deposits a sediment; the febrile tempest abates to a

calm; and the body recovers the exercise of all its usual functions.

Sometimes indeed there are varieties; such as little or no cold stage,

or sweat.

A Comparative View of the Mortality of the Human Species, at All Ages And of the Diseases and Casualties by Which They Are Destroyed or Annoyed. Illustrated With Charts and Tables · 第 4 / 21 段