Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 2.djvu/233

 work. Since the inhabitants have been better clothed and fed, epidemics have quite disappeared from the rye-land country; intermittent, unless from some accidental cause, are never met with, and typhus, for several years, has been very rare. It occasionally happens that the houses near the Stour are flooded several times in the course of the year, after which, typhus has appeared in these houses; but several years frequently pass without any flood. I have likewise, occasionally, seen typhus very general upon the hills in the coal district, where the water remains a long time upon the surface of the ground, covered, in autumn, by dead leaves, and the cottages are surrounded by trees.

In the rye-lands, glandular diseases are very general. Phthisis is very common, and, in some parishes, there is scarcely a family but has suffered more or less from its ravages. Disease of the mesenteric glands is likewise very general, but the severe external forms of scrofula are unusual: bronchocele is met with in all parts of the country.

The working classes here are bad managers; potatoes, with a very little bacon, or fat mutton broiled, and the fat poured over the potatoes, is their common food; none of the family will touch buttermilk or whey. When the children are weaned, they eat sop; or bread soaked in weak tea with some sugar; and, as soon as they are old enough, they live upon the potatoes and melted fat, and drink water.

The agricultural labourers get from eight to ten shillings a week, and a gallon of cider or beer a day; sometimes they get a small barrel of cider, or brew a