SWEATING-SICKNESS. Ephemera Sudatoria, Ephemera Mangna, &d or A syliens, Ilyelronones, are the various names which have been given to a severe epidemic disease that prevailed in this country and in some parts of the Continent at different periods during the latter part of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th centuries. The invasion of this disease was generally quite sudden, some persons experiencing a actuation as of a hot vapour extending over the body, while others felt as if consumed by an internal fire; there was violent fever, pain in the head and limbs, prostration of strength, hurried breathing, a small frequent pulse, nausea, great thirst, delirium, and excessive restless ness. Shortly after the appearance of these symptoms a profuse clammy fetid perspiration broke out over the whole body; the thirst became !Dore intolerable, and the patients either died in a state of delirium or coma, or recovered as suddenly as they had been first attacked. Such was the rapidity with which this disease ran its course, that ha victims were sometimes carried off in three or four hours, or even before the sweating stage had set in ; and all danger was con eidered to be at an end if the patient survived the first twenty-four hours. The profuse sweating which characterised the disease was looked upon as an effort of nature to get rid of some morbific matter from the system, and the early appearance of this stage was, therefore, regarded as a favourable circumstance. Accordingly, when persona were attacked, it was usual to put them immediately to bed, without even removing their clothes, to enjoin absolute quietude, and to en courage the outbreak of the perspiration by heating the room, covering them well up from the air, and giving them mild cordials. If the sweating stage were tardy in appearing under the influence of these means, friction was had recourse to; and if the patient were at the game time very feeble, drinks of a more stimulating quality were administered : fumigations with etorax, laurel, or juniper berries were also employed. These remedies were persisted in till the sweating was fully established. After twelve or fifteen hours the coverings of the patient were diminished, the apartment was made cooler, and the air was impregnated with the vapour of vinegar; sleeping was not allowed at this stage of the complaint unless the pulse was strong, it having been observed that those who indulged in this propensity seldom woke At the end of twenty-four hours the linen was all changed, nourishing food was gradually administered ; and on the second or third day, if the weather was propitious, the patients were allowed to go out. This mode of treatment, which is so different from that pur sued in the present day in analogous diseases, does not appear to have been adopted simply with the view of hastening the accession of the sweating stage, but from the experience of the injurious influence of cold in this several fatal cases having been attributed to the mere exposure of the patient's arms to the air while in bed.
The sweating-sickness is said to have made its first appearance in this country In the army of the earl of Richmond, on his landing at Milford Haven in the year 1485. On the 21st of September of the
same year it reached London, where it raged till the latter end of October. It reappeared in this country during the summers of 1506, 1517, 1528, and 1551. From 1525 to 1530 it visited Holland, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Poland, and parts of Russia ; and Forestus informs us (lib. vi., obe, 8) that it broke out in Amsterdam on the 27th of September, 1529, where It raged but four days, sparing only old people and children, and attacking above one hundred persons a day. With respect to tho mortality of this disease accounts are somewhat vague.
Bacon informs us that in the first epidemic the patients recovered if they were attended to in time, but that many died before a remedy was discovered. The epidemic of 1517 appears to have been particu larly fatal, frequently destroying its victims in two or three hours, and in some places carrying off one-third, and even one-half of the inhabi tants: that of 1528 was also very fatal. but was remarkable for its short duration in each place. The last outbreak of this disease in England happened at Shrewsbury in the year 1551, and was extremely fatal, sparing neither age nor sex : it raged from April to September, be coming milder in character towards its termination.
The origin and causes of this malady are still involved in considerable mystery. Bacon of it as a terrible and unknown disease, that had its origin neither in the blood nor in the humours ; a surprise of nature, rather than obstinate to remedies. Drs. Otitis and Mead believed it to be a modification of the plague ; and Dr. Mead says that it was imported into this country from France, whither it had been conveyed in 1480, from the island of Rhodes, at that time besieged by the Turks. Caine affirms that the two epidemics of 1517 and 1528 were brought to England from Florence and Naples, at which places the plague was then moing, and that it was the same disease, only modified by climate. Cullen thought it a variety of typhne ; and Dr. Willan suggested that it might have been produced by some disease in the wheat at those periods at which it prevailed, just as the Asiatic or malignant cholera has been attributed to the eating of bad rice. Opinions are not less at variance respecting the antiquity of this disease, and its identity with that which still prevails on some parts of the Continent, to which the term of " La Suette " has been applied. M. Bayer, without giving a decided opinion on the subject, admits that although there are notable differences between the two diseases in point of duration and gravity, yet there is an incontestible analogy between them. It is perhaps impossible at this distance of time to decide the question : we shall therefore conclude this article by referring those who may feel an interest in the subject to M. Rayer'a Histoire de l'Epidemie de la Snette-Miliare qui a r4gmi en 1821, dans lea Departemens de l'Oise et de Seine-et-Oise, Svo., Paris, 1822.