Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 4.djvu/294

 192 chest are frequently classed under the name of consumption, that the great majority of cases classed under the head of phthisis in any of our public institutions, are really genuine examples of the true tuberculous consumption. It does not, however, follow, from this, that there is any necessary proportion in the degree of prevalence of scrofulous phthisis and the other forms of scrofula; on the contrary, it is possible that where the morbid diathesis manifests itself strongly in one form, it may do so feebly in the others. It would not follow, therefore, as a matter of course, that consumption must he a very prevalent disease in this district, even if it were fully established that external scrofula were so.

It is hardly necessary to remark, that my own observation, and the testimony of the local practitioners, go to establish the existence of consumption as a disease of very frequent occurrence; because it will be universally admitted that it is so in every part of England, and, indeed, it may be said, in every part of Europe, if not in the world. Without referring to statistical documents, l should say, as a general observation, that consumption is as prevalent in the Landsend district as in Sussex; and that it is more prevalent in both than in Scotland. I found it affecting all classes of persons, but in an especial manner miners, I shall have occasion, in a subsequent section, to enter more particularly into the nature of the consumptive diseases of the Cornish miners; it may suffice here to remark, that the opinion is universal among the medical practitioners of the district, that the genuine phthisis, slightly modified indeed in many cases, is of vastly more frequent