lightening the world, fhould thus differ among ther felves, and make even the profeffion ridiculous! Sure the world is wide enough, at leaft, for two great perfonages to figure in; men of fcience fhould leave controverfy to the little world below them; and then we might fee Rock and Franks walking together hand-in-hand, fmiling onward to immortality.

Next to these is doctor Walker, preparator of his own medicines. This gentleman is remarkable for an averfion to quacks; frequently cautioning the publick to be careful into what hands they commit their fafety; by which he would infinuate that if they do not employ him alone, they must be undone. His public fpirit is equal to his fuccefs. Not for himself, but his country, is the gally-pot prepared and the drops fealed up with proper directions for any part of the town or country. All this is for his country's good: fo that he is now grown old in the practice of phyfic and virtue; and, to ufe his own elegance of expreffion, There is not fuch another medicine as his in the world again.

This, my friend, is a formidable triumvirate; and yet, formidable as they are, I am refolved to defend the honour of Chinefe phyfic against them all. I have made a vow to fummon doctor Rock to a folemn difputation in all the myfteries of the profeffion, before the face of every Philomath, ftudent in aftrology, and member of the learned focieties. I adhere to, and venerate the doctrines of old Wang-fhu-ho. In the very teeth of oppofition I will maintain, That the heart is the fon of the liver, which has the kidneys for its mother, and the ftomach for its wife *. I have therefore drawn up a difputation challenge, which is to be sent speedily, to this effect:

* See Du Halde, vol. II. fol. p. 185.

I, Lien

I, Lien Chi Altangi, D. D. K. H. native of Honan in China, to Richard Rock, F. U. N. native of Garbage-alley in Wapping, defiance. Though, Sir, I am perfectly fenfible of your importance, though no ftranger to your ftudies in the path of nature, yet there may be many things in the art of phyfic with which you are yet unacquainted. I know full Iwell a doctor thou art, great Rock, and fo am I. Wherefore I challenge, and do hereby invite you to a trial of learning upon hard problems, and knotty phyfical points. In this debate we will calmly inveftigate the whole theory and practice of medicine, botany and chymiftry; and I invite all the philomaths, with many of the lecturers in medicine, to be prefent at the difpute: which, I hope, will be carried on with due decorum, with proper gravity, and as befits men of erudition and fcience, among each other. But before we meet face to face, I would thus publicly, and in the face of the whole world, defire you to answer me one queftion; I ask it with the fame earneftnefs with which you have often folicited the publick; anfwer me, I fay, at once, without having recourfe to your phyfical dictionary, which of those three diforders, incident to the human body, is the moft fatal, the fyncope, parenthefis, or apoplexy? I beg your reply may be as public as this my demand *. I am, as hereafter may be, your admirer, or your rival. Adieu.

The day after this was published the editor received an anfwer, in which the doctor feems to be of opinion, that the apoplexy is moft fatal.

LETTER

LETTER LXVIII.

TO THE SAME.

INDULGENT Nature feems to have exempted this ifland from many of those epidemic evils which are fo fatal in other parts of the world. A want of rain but for a few days beyond the expected season in China, fpreads famine, defolation, and terror over the whole country; the winds that blow from the brown bofom of the Western defart are impregnated with death in every gale; but in this fortunate land of Britain, the inhabitant courts health in every breeze, and the husbandman ever fows in joyful expectation.

But though the nation be exempt from real evils, think not, my friend, that it is more happy on this account than others. They are afflicted, it is true, with neither famine nor peftilence, but then there is a diforder peculiar to the country, which every feafon makes strange ravages among them; it spreads with peftilential rapidity, and infects almost every rank of people; what is ftill more strange the natives have no name for this peculiar malady, though well known to foreign phyficians by the appellation of Epidemic terror.

A season is never known to pass in which the people are not vifited by this cruel calamity in one fhape or another, feemingly different though ever the fame: one year it iffues from a baker's fhop in the shape of a fixpenny loaf, the next it takes the appearance of a comet with a fiery tail, a third it threatens like a flat-bottomed boat, and a fourth it carries confternation at the bite of a mad dog. The people, when

once

once infected, lose their relish for happiness, faunter about with looks of defpondence, afk after the calamities of the day, and receive no comfort but in heightening each other's diftrefs. It is infignificant how remote or near, how weak or powerful the object of terror may be, when once they refolve to fright and be frighted, the meereft trifles fow consternation and difmay, each proportions his fears not to the object, but to the dread he discovers in the countenance of others; for when once the fermentation is begun, it goes on of itself, though the original caufe be difcontinued which firft fet it in

motion.

A dread of mad dogs is the epidemic terror which now prevails, and the whole nation is at prefent actually groaning under the malignity of its influence. The people fally from their houses with that circumfpection which is prudent in fuch as expect a mad dog at every turning. The physician publishes his prefcription, the beadle prepares his halter, and a few of unusual bravery arm themselves with boots and buff gloves, in order to face the enemy if he fhould offer to attack them. In fhort, the whole people ftand bravely upon their defence, and feem by their present fpirit to fhew a refolution of not being tamely bit by mad dogs any longer.

Their manner of knowing whether a dog be mad or no fomewhat refembles the antient European cuftom of trying witches. The old woman fufpected was tied hand and foot and thrown into the water. If the fwam, then fhe was inftantly carried off to be burnt for a witch, if the funk, then indeed fhe was acquitted of the charge, but drowned in the experiment. In the fame manner a crowd gather round a dog fufpected of madness, and they begin by teazing the devoted animal on every fide; if he attempts to ftand upon the defenfive and bite, then is he unaniVOL. III.

T

moufly

moufly found guilty, for a mad dog always fnaps at every thing if, on the contrary, he ftrives to escape by running away, then he can expect no compaffion, for mad dogs always run straight forward before them. It is pleafant enough for a neutral being like me, who have no fhare in these ideal calamities, to mark the ftages of this national disease. The terror at first feebly enters with a difregarded ftory of a little dog, that had gone through a neighbouring village, that was thought to be mad by feveral that had feen him. The next account comes, that a mastiff ran through a certain town, and had bit five geefe, which immediately run mad, foamed at the bill, and died in great agonies foon after. Then comes an affecting hiftory of a little boy bit in the leg, and gone down to be dipt in the falt water; when the people have fufficiently fhuddered at that, they are next congealed with a frightful account of a man who was faid lately to have died from a bite he had received fome years before. This relation only prepares the way for another, ftill more hideous, as how the mafter of a family, with feven fmall children, were all bit by a mad lap dog, and how the poor father firft perceived the infection by calling for a draught of water, where he faw the lap dog fwimming in the cup.

When epidemic terror is thus once excited, every morning comes loaded with fome new difafter; as in ftories of ghofts each loves to hear the account, though it only ferves to make him uneafy, fo here each liftens with eagerness, and adds to the tidings new circumftances of peculiar horror. A lady for inftance, in the country, of very weak nerves has been frighted by the barking of a dog; and this, alas! too frequently happens. The ftory foon is improved and spreads, that a mad dog had frighted a lady of diftinction. These circumstances begin to grow