vived to the eighth or eleventh day. In all these the throat was but little affected. The pulfe, in thefe cafes, was, from the very beginning, fo quick, feeble, and irregular, that it was scarce practicable to count it for half a minute at a time. The eyes exhibited an equable, fhining redness, refembling that which is obfervable in the eye of a ferret; and yet the strongest light was not offenfive. This redness might firft be perceived in those parts of the eye that were covered by the upper eyelid. Small circular fpots of a livid colour frequently appeared about the breaft.

Sometimes, even ten or fifteen days after the ceffation of the fever, a new disease appeared. After a few days amendment, fome new symptoms retard and finally ftop the patient's further approach towards health, and at length terminate in an univerfal fwelling of the anafarcous kind, or fometimes in an afcites. In fome, the dropfy affects the brain, producing the coma vigil delirium, and blindness: in others, it falls upon the lungs, and produces every fymptom of the true hydrops pectoris.

After having given a diftinct hiftory of this difeafe, followed by an account of the more material observations made by preceding authors, on the fpecies of scarlet fever most nearly refembling it, Dr. Withering points out the characteristic symp toms which diftinguish it from other disorders feemingly allied to it. These are, fevers of the petechial kind, the purple fever, measles, eryfipelas, and particularly the ulcerated fore throat. On this laft head he makes the following obfervations :

There is yet another disease so much refembling our epidemic in many of its leading symptoms, that I acknowledge it is not an easy task to diftinguifh them; and yet the diftinction is a matter of the greatest importance, as the method of treatment ought to be extremely different. The Reader will readily guefs that I allude to the Angina Gangrænofa, or ulcerated fore throat. They are both epidemic, they are both contagious: the mode of feizure, the first appearances in the throat, are nearly the fame in both: a red efflorefcence upon the fkin, a great tendency to delirium, and a frequent, fmall, unsteady pulfe, are likewise common to both.'-He adds, that it is not wonderful that, with features fo ftrikingly alike, and fo obvious, many practitioners confidered them as the fame difeafe; and that others, though fenfible of fome little differences, ftill concluded them to be of the fame nature-both putrid, and both accordingly requiring a fimilar mode of treatment. The differences between them are given in a table, containing a comparative or contrafted view of these two difeafes, exhibited in oppofite columns; from which we fhall extract fome of the more diftinguishing symptoms of each.

Under

2

Under the Articles of Seafon, Air, and Situation, it appears that this fearlet fever reigns in fummer and autumn; in a hot and dry air; and in high, dry, and gravelly fituations: whereas the ulcerated fore throat is prevalent in fpring and winter; in a warm and moist air; and in close, low, damp, and marshy places. The former attacks the vigorous or robuft, without diftinction of fexes: the latter feizes the delicate, and particularly women and female children.-In the fcarlet fever, the eyes exhibit a fhining, equable, intense redness, and are seldom watery in the gangrenous fore throat, the eyes are inflamed and watery, or funk and dead.-In the former, in fummer, the tonfils, &c. are little tumefied, and without floughs; in autumn, they are more fwelled, the integuments separate, and white floughs appear in the latter, the tonfils are confiderably. fwelled and ulcerated, and the floughs are of a dark brown colour. The breath, in the former, is not fœtid: in the latter, it is offenfive to the patients and their affiftants.-The blood, in the former, is buffy and firm in the latter, florid and tender. The fcarlet fever terminates on the third, fifth, eighth, or eleventh day: the ulcerated fore throat has no stated period. -In fine-and the diftinction is a very material one-the former is characterised as an inflammatory, and the latter as a putrid disease.

After this enumeration of the principal characteristical fymptoms and circumftances attending the two diseases, it will obviously follow that a method of treatment highly falutary in one of them must be noxious in the other. No medicine, fays the Author, ever had a fairer or fuller trial in any disease, than the bark had in our epidemic. The great proftration of ftrength, the feeble pulfe, and the sharp heat upon the skin, with here and there a livid spot, were thought to be fuch undeniable evidences of the putrid tendency of the disease, and of the broken texture of the blood, that the bark was poured down with a moft unfparing hand. And again, in the autumn, the increased disease in the throat, and the floughed appearance of the tonfils, conspired to keep up the delufion. It was very generally believed that bark was the only medicine that could be depended upon; and mankind had not yet forgotten how many lives were loft in the first attacks of the ulcerated fore throat, before they became acquainted with the efficacy of the bark.'-The Author nevertheless affirms, that by the liberal exhibition of it, and of cordials, much harm was done; and, in particular, that the inflammation of the tonfils, &c. was thereby greatly increased, and the whole lining of the fauces converted into a stinking flough.

The first and principal remedy recommended by the Author, and employed with the greatest fuccefs, was a powerful vomit,

frequently

frequently repeated. On the very first attack, it seldom failed to remove the disease at once. He recommends a vomit likewise as the beft of preventatives; in confequence of his opinion that this contagion firft made its lodgment upon the pituitary membrane lining the nofe and fauces; from whence an emetic dif lodges it, and prevents its defcent into the ftomach. Another prophylactic recommended by the Author is the caustic alcali, or foap-leys diluted with water, and used as a gargle, on account of its chemical quality of diffolving mucus, and deftroying all the peculiar properties of animal matter. He ufes likewife the vegetable fixed alcali pretty liberally, though largely diluted, as a diuretic; confidering the medicines of this clafs as most to be depended upon in this difeafe, next to emetics.-But we fhall not dwell further on the Author's method of cure, as we cannot suppose that, after this notification, by which we principally mean to put practitioners on their guard against this dif cafe, any of our medical Readers will neglect to confult the pamphlet itself, for information respecting this and many other particulars, relative to a distemper probably fo little known to them as the present.

The Public were highly obliged to Dr. Fothergill for the light which he threw on the nature and proper treatment of the ulcerated fore throat: and equal obligations appear to be due to Dr. Withering, for his early account of the difeafe which he has fo well described, and the true character of which he ap pears to have fo well ascertained, in this little treatise.

MONTHLY CATALOGUE, For MARCH, 1779.

POETICA L.

Art. 10. An Elegy on the much lamented Death of a most ingenious young Gentleman, who lately died in the College of Edinburgh, where he was a Student. 4to. I S. Robinfon. 1778.

"TH

HE ingenious and accomplished young Gentleman, whofe untimely death gave birth to this Elegy,-was a student three years at Edinburgh;-where the caufe of his death was a putrid fever, which he got by diffecting the brain of a child who died of a dropfy in the head. A very small time before his death, he, by unanimous confent, and with univerfal applaufe, obtained the prizemedal proposed by the Esculapian Society of Edinburgh, for the best effay on the means of diftinguishing pus from mucus. For an account of his learned and ingenious differtation, which juftly procured him fo much honour of his other writings; of his much lamented death, and molt amiable character; fee the 19th Number of the Medical Commentaries, from p. 329 to p. 336.

Confidered as the pious tribute of friendship, this Elegy, which abound with natural expreffions of tenderness and fincere regret, demands the most generous applaufe; but, regarded as an

attempt

attempt at poetical compofition, we have little to fay in its praise. With perfect juftice, therefore, as well as, we believe, unaffected modefty, does this fentimental and feeling Writer declare, in his advertisement, that he lays no claim, nor indeed hath he any pretenfions, to poetic merit.'

Art. 11. Bath,-a Simile. Bath,-a Conversation-Piece. Bath,-a Medley. Preceded by a Prologue to the Critics; fucceeded by a Rhapfody, on the Death of Mr. Garrick. 4to. 2s. 6d. Whieldon and Co. 1779.

There is more wit than poetry in this medley. The fimile, in particular, in which Bath is compared to a fet of tea-equipage, of Wedgwood's cream-coloured ware, and which runs through as many verfes as Swift's poem on Bally-Spelling, is well made out. We should have liked the performance better, if we had met with fewer Sternboldian lines in it. But, poffibly, the quaint fimplicity of his strains is meant as a conftituent part of the Author's waggery. Art. 12. Party Satire Satirized. A Poem. 4to. I s. 6 d.

Bladon. 1779.

A lick at the lafhers; who are reprefented as a pack of feditious

libellers:

By mad caprice, or patriotic spite,
Induc'd for Congress gloriously to write.
Each rhyming Garreteer, howe'er diftrefs'd,
In Tranfatlantic fervice would be prefs'd.
Their liberties, like fons of ancient Rome,
They prize too high to keep their wits at home:
For injur'd poor America they bawl,

*

Rejoic'd to fee her rife by England's fall;

}

Thus politics makes rebels of us all.'

Art. 13. The Tears of Britannia: a folemn Appeal to all her Sons at this tremendous Juncture +: A Poem addreffed to the First Lord of the Admiralty, the Commanders of the Militia, &c. 4to. 2 s. 6 d. Ch. Rivington. 1779.

It is expected that poetical tears fhould flow according to the laws of Melody, Harmony, &c. but here we have the most unmufical blubbering that hath been heard fince the days of Withers and Taylor the water poet. In short, this weeper in verfe is a downright rebel against all poetic authority. If the Writer of the following couplet were, by chance, to ftray within the confines of Parnaffus, the beadle of the facred mount would certainly take him into cuftody," as a diforderly person, and a pilferer :

The wounded war-fhip, now no longer strong,

Drags like a wounded fnake her maim'd length along. But if the Author is a rebel in poetry, he is a loyal subject in politics; witness the following addrefs to a noble Lord :

On thee, O Sandwich, equal to the weight,
Now refts thy anxious country's naval fate:

* "I rejoice that America has refifted," faid a late patriotic Earl in the House of Peers." AUTHOR'S Note.

This feems to bear reference to the problematical fea-fight of July 27, 1778.

Able

Able thou art, and worthy to prefide,
Brunswick vouchfafes to choose thee for his guide;
Envy in spite of Faction fhall declare
Thy labours honeft, and thy toils fincere ;

To ferve thy country, men like thee must feel
For decent Fame, and love the public weal.

That decent fame was however an unlucky throw, and hath af forded room for fome critics to conjecture that the whole compliment (of which we have copied but half) is ironical; but we confider it as mere fimple praife:-fo much the worse, some readers will fay; but that is no fault of ours.

Art. 14. The Anti-Palliferiad; or, Britain's Triumph over France. Dedicated to the Hon. Auguftus Keppel. 4to. I s. 6d. Bew. Heav'n fure winks not at treach'ry fo profound!

Stern vengeance muft her right severe exact;
Aroufe the fleeping genius of the isle,
Its thunders point against the Gallic foe;
By Keppel led, no more to 'fcape his ire,
Nor fafety find from Palliferian fraud.'

If the foregoing lines are not wholly fufficient to determine the rank and character of this panegyric on Mr. Keppel, let the following be thrown in as a make-weight:

In heroic spirit Briton drew her sword.'• Too clement Briton to a conquer'd foe!'

The Admiral must be vanity-proof, indeed, if he be not overelated with all the fine things that are faid of him, and to him! Art. 15. An Heroic Congratulation, addreffed to the Hon. Au

guftus Keppel, Admiral of the Blue; on his being unanimously, honourably, and fully acquitted of the Five malicious and illfounded Charges exhibited against him by Sir Hugh Pallifer, Vice-Admiral of the Blue. To which is annexed, an Address to the Public, containing the Five Charges, interfperfed with Metaphors, Animadverfions, and Allufions, fuitable to the Subject, to display their Abfurdity, and vindicate the untarnished Honour of the British Navy. 4to. I s. 6d. DodЛley, &c.

What an happy man is this Admiral! Verse-men and profe-men, and authors who write neither profe nor verfe, all brandifh their pens, and join the general huzza for Admiral Keppel! The following two pair of lines will ferve as a fample of this heroic Congratulation:

• What's more incredible than all before!

A third Charge fays, the Blue's Vice Adm'ral wore ;

And laid his head towards the enemy,

Then in their wake, as near as he cou'd be.'

If this Gentleman's Mufe has done with the Court-martial, we would recommend to her attention the Seffions-houfe at the OldBailey. The trials, in that court, in rhyme, might procure us an annual volume, which would bid fair to rival WITHERS's Britain's Remembrancer, and WARD's verfification of Clarendon's Hiftory of the Rebellion.

Art.