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  THE
  PLAGUE
  AT
  _MARSEILLES_
  CONSIDER'D:


  With REMARKS upon the PLAGUE in General,
  shewing its Cause and Nature of INFECTION,
  with necessary Precautions to prevent the spreading
  of that DIREFUL DISTEMPER. Publish'd
  for the PRESERVATION of the People
  of GREAT-BRITAIN.

  Also some Observations taken from an Original
  Manuscript of a Graduate Physician, who resided
  in LONDON during the whole Time of
  the late Plague, _Anno_ 1665.


  By RICHARD BRADLEY, F. R. S.


  The THIRD EDITION.


  _LONDON_:
  Printed for W. MEARS at the _Lamb_ without _Temple-Bar_. 1721.
  Price 1_s._




  TO
  Sir ISAAC NEWTON
  President of the Royal Society, _&c._


_SIR_,

To Act under Your Influence, is to do Good, and to Study the Laws of
Nature, is the Obligation I owe to the Royal Society, who have so wisely
placed Sir _Isaac Newton_ at their Head.

The following Piece, therefore, as I design it for the Publick Good,
naturally claims _Your_ Patronage, and, as it depends chiefly upon Rules
in Nature, I am doubly obliged to offer it to the President of that
Learned Assembly, whose Institution was for the Improvement of Natural
Knowledge.

  _I am, Sir
     With due Respect,
       Your most obliged,
         Humble Servant,_

           R. BRADLEY.




PREFACE.


_There would be little Occasion for a Preface to this Treatise, if the
last Foreign Advices had not given us something particular relating to the
Pestilence that now rages in the South Parts of_ France; _and what may
more particularly recommend these Relations to the World, is, because they
come from Physicians, who resided at the Infected Places._


The Physician at _Aix_ gives us the following Account.

_The Contagious Distemper, which has become the Reproach of our Faculty
here for above a Month past, is more violent than that at_ Marseilles; _it
breaks out in Carbuncles, Buboes, livid Blisters, and purple Spots; the
first Symptoms are grievous Pains in the Head, Consternations, wild Looks,
a trembling Voice, a cadaverous Face, a Coldness in all the extreme Parts,
a low unequal Pulse, great Pains in the Stomach, Reachings to Vomit, and
these are follow'd by Sleepiness, Deliriums, Convulsions, or Fluxes of
Blood, the Forerunners of sudden Death. In the Bodies that are open'd,
we find gangrenous Inflammations in all the lower Parts of the Belly,
Breast and Neck. Above fifty Persons have died every Day for three Weeks
past in the Town and Hospitals. Most of them fall into a dreadful Phrenzy,
so that we are forc'd to tie them._


_The other is a Letter from a Physician at_ Marseilles, _sent to_ John
Wheake, _Esq; who was so kind to give me the Abstract._

Marseilles _Sept._ 15. 1720.

Sir,

I Arriv'd here the 8_th_, and enter'd the Gate of _Aix_ which leads to the
_Cours_, which has always been esteem'd one of the most pleasant
Prospects in the Kingdom, but that Day was a very dismal Spectacle to me;
all that great Place, both on the Right and Left, was fill'd with Dead,
Sick, and Dying Persons. The Carts were continually employ'd in going and
returning to carry away the Dead Carcasses, of which there were that Day
above four Thousand. The Town was without Bread, without Wine, without
Meat, without Medicines, and in general, without any Succours.

The Father abandon'd the Child, and the Son the Father; the Husband the
Wife, and the Wife the Husband; and those who had not a House to
themselves, lay upon Quilts in the Streets and the Pavements; all the
Streets were fill'd with Cloaths and Houshold-Goods, strew'd with Dead
Dogs and Cats, which made an insupportable Stench. Meat was Sold at 18 to
20 _Sous per_ Pound, and was only distributed to those that had Billets
from the Consuls: This, Sir, was the miserable State of this City at that
Time, but at present, Things have a better appearance; Monsieur _le
Marquis de Langeron_, who