Page:Repository of Arts, Series 1, Volume 01, 1809, January-June.djvu/151

Rh sisting the introduction of a species of inoculation which must and will eventually extirpate that scourge of the human race, the small-pox. But there is a conspiracy of a few interested individuals against the good sense and respectable portion of the profession: they are obviously men of little professional eminence, and their obscurity was friendly to them; the instant they left its protecting shade, their views were manifested. They are known and properly appreciated in the medical world; but, unfortunately for the cause of humanity, many good and amiable individuals have been misled by their false statements and sophistical arguments, and have actually, under the belief that they were conferring a benefit upon their neighbours, introduced the smallpox contagion into cottages and hamlets, where it was before unknown. I allude to those respectable ladies and country clergymen, who imagine they are beneficially employed when they are infecting their poor neighbours with the foulest and most fatal plague winch is permitted to afflict suffering mortals. I beseech such as these to stay awhile their work of death, and to reflect upon what they are about: they perhaps do not immediately destroy the helpless wretches in whom they emit the poison, but they are answerable for the deaths of all who fall the victims of the contagion in the adjacent country, and it is impossible to calculate its extreme subtlety, and the facility with which it is conveyed, by the air and by people's clothes, to a very great distance.

This extraordinary animal was bred by a Mr. Sharp, near Melton-Mowbray, Leicestershire, and is now the property of Mr. Matron, of Compton-street, Clerkenwell: it is about three years old, and is  ''No. II. Vol. I.'' R