A Discourse on the Plague by Richard Mead (early readers txt) 📕

WHAT relates to the inclosing Infected Places with Lines, I have so regulated, that no body can be subjected to any Degree of Hardship thereby: for I have provided, that free Liberty be given to every one, that pleases, to depart from the Infected Place, without being put to any other Difficulty, than the Performance of a short Quarantaine of about three Weeks, in some Place of Safety. So that no one shall be compelled to continue in the infected Town, whom his own Circumstances will not confine.

THIS part of my Directions is not so general as the rest, because some Places are too great to admit of it: which occasioned my proposing it with a Restriction[13]. But as this is a great Inconvenience to the rest of the Country, so it is far from being any Advantage to the Place thus left unguarded. For when all, who leave an infected Place, carry with them Certificates of their having submitted to such Quarantaine, as may remove all Cause of Suspicion, Travelling will be much more safe and commodious, than otherwise it can be. For want of this, when the Plague was last at London, it was difficult to withdraw from it, while the Country was every where afraid of Strangers, and the Inns on the Roads were unsafe to lodge in for those, who travelled from the City; when it could not be known, but Infection might be received in them by others come from the same Place.

AND from hence it happened that the Plague, when last in England, though much more moderate, and though it continued not above one Year in the City of London, did yet spread it self over a great Part of England, getting into Kent, even as far as Dover; into Sussex, Hampshire,[Pg xxviii] Dorsetshire, Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire, Warwickshire, Derbyshire, and, to mention no more, as far as Newcastle[14].

THUS, as I have examined through the Course of the following Treatise, with all possible Care, into the Agreement of my Precepts with the Nature of the Plague; so I have now considered how far they can conveniently be put in Practice.

BUT it is time to have done with a Subject by no means agreeable.

I shall therefore conclude all I have to say upon this Matter, with a Paper well deserving Perusal, which is come to my Hands, since the following Sheets were finished; and therefore too late to be made use of in its proper Place: for which Reason, I shall give it here entire. This Paper contains the Methods taken by his late Majesty, when the Plague in the Year 1712. had entered his Dominions in Germany. It was delivered to me from Mr. Backmeister, the Secretary at Hanover to his Majesty for the German Affairs, who was the Person, that issued out the Orders that were given. This Relation I requested from the Secretary, being desirous to know how far the Measures then taken, agreed with my Directions: because I had been informed, that they were very successful. And I have the Satisfaction to find them very conformable to my Precepts; and that they had so much the desired Effect, as to stop the Plague from spreading beyond the small Number of Towns and Villages recited at the beginning of the Paper.

Hanover, Feb. 10. N. S. 1722.

In 1712 and 1713, the Plague raged in these Parts, at the following Places.

IN the last Place, three labouring Men, who had made their Escape from Hamburgh, got into a Barn in the Night, and were found dead there the next Morning, with Marks of the Plague upon them: but the Progress of the Infection was stopt by burning the Barn.

AS soon as any Village was infected, the first Thing done was to make a Line round it, thereby to hinder the Inhabitants from communicating with others. Those who were thus shut up, were immediately furnished with Provisions: a Physician was sent to them; and especially some Surgeons; a Minister to officiate particularly to Persons infected; a Nurse; Buriers; &c.

THE principal Management of this whole Affair consisted in two Things: 1. In separating the Sick from the Sound; and 2. In cleaning well the Houses which had been infected.

WHEN any Person was taken ill, he was obliged to leave his Lodging, and retire into a Lazaretto or Hospital, built for that Purpose. The other Persons, who appeared to be well in the same House, were obliged, when it was practicable, to strip themselves in the Night quite naked, to put on other Clothes, which were provided for them, and to go to perform Quarantaine in a House appointed for it, after having burnt the Clothes, they had put off. Persons were made to change their Clothes, and those they put off were burnt, as often as was judged necessary: For Example, this was done when those who had recovered their Health, came out of the Lazaretto and went into Quarantaine; and likewise, when (after the Disease was ceased) the Women who attended the Sick, the Buriers, and Surgeons, went into Quarantaine.

[Pg xxxiii]IN Summer, ordinary Barracks (or Huts) were made for those of the common People, who were obliged to quit infected Houses: which Barracks were afterwards burnt, when they had been made Use of.

AS soon as the People were come out of an infected House, it was nailed up, and Centinels were posted there, that nothing might be stolen out of it. In the Country, when such a House was not of very great Value, and it might be done without Danger, it was burnt, and the Loss was made good to the Owner, at the Expence of the Publick. But in Towns, where this could not be done, without the Hazard of burning the Town, Men were hired to go into the Houses, and bring into the Court-Yard, or before the House, whatever Goods they found in it susceptible of Contagion, and there burn them: but to prevent the Fright which this might raise among the Neighbours, such Goods were sometimes put into the Cart, used to carry off dead Bodies, and so conveyed out of the Town and burnt. At first, the Method taken, was only to bury such Goods deep in the Ground: but it was found by several Examples, that they were dug up again, and that the Infection was thereby renewed. Before People were paid for their Houses and Effects, that were burnt, it was discovered, that they often laid some of their Goods out of the Way, and that the Contagion was spread by them: but after they came to be paid what was reasonable, by the Publick, they willingly let all be burnt, without concealing any thing.

IN Summer, the Cattle were left abroad, and the Inhabitants, who had not the Plague in their Houses were obliged to look after them: In Winter, the Sound Persons were obliged, before they left an infected House, to kill the Cattle belonging to it, and to bury them ten Foot deep in the Ground near the House.

So far the former Preface.

I think it now proper to take Notice, that an Act of Parliament (as above mentioned in this Preface) formed upon the Precepts here delivered, having been passed on December 8, 1720. the two last Clauses in the said Act, relating to the removing of Sick Persons from their Habitations, and the making of Lines about Places infected, were on October 19 of the following Year, repealed.

THIS looks as if the Rules prescribed were not right and just: I must therefore observe, in Justification of myself, that this was not the Case. Nothing was urged in that Repeal against the Reasonableness of the Directions in themselves, more than in these Words: That the Execution of them might be very grievous to the Subjects of this Kingdom. But this I have proved to be quite otherwise.

THE Truth of the Matter is this: Some great Men, both of the Lords and Commons, who were in the Opposition to the Court, objected that the Ministry were not to be intrusted with such Powers, lest they should abuse them; since they might, upon Occasion, by their Officers, either remove or confine Persons not favoured by the Government, on Pretence that their Houses were infected.

VAIN and groundless as these Fears were, yet the Clamours industriously raised from them were so strong, that a great Officer in the State[Pg xxxvii] thought fit to oblige his Enemies by giving way to them: and tho’ a Motion made in the House of Commons for repealing these two Clauses had just been rejected; yet upon making the same in the House of Lords, with his Consent, the thing was done.

WHETHER private or public Considerations had the greater Share in bringing about this Compliance, I will not determine. Such Counter-Steps will happen in a Government, where there is too much of Faction, and too little of a Public Spirit. This I very well remember, that a learned Prelate, now dead, who had more of Political than of Christian Zeal, and was one who made the loudest Noise about the Quarantaine Bill, frankly owned to me in Conversation, that tho’ the Directions were good, yet he and his Friends had resolved to take that Opportunity of shewing their Disaffection to the Ministry.

[Pg xxxviii]BUT after all, it contributed not a little to the carrying this Point, that the Plague was now ceased at Marseilles, and a Stop put to its Progress in the Provinces. And I cannot but take notice that this last good Service was done by the same Method, which, tho’ in a more moderate way, I have here proposed. For it is well known that the Regent of France did at last set Bounds to the Contagion by Lines and Barriers guarded by Soldiers: which wise Resolution saved not only his own but other Countries from the spreading of a Disease, which seems to have been of as violent a kind as ever was brought into Europe.

HOWEVER, if there were any Severity in Orders of this kind, every Man ought to consider himself as a Member of the Society; by the Laws of which as he receives many Advantages, so he gives up somewhat of his own private Rights to the Public: and must therefore be perfectly satisfied with whatever is found necessary for the common Good; altho’ it may, on particular Occasions, bring upon him some Inconveniences and Sufferings.