Page:Transactions of the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association, volume 4.djvu/316

 214 table as uncommonly great, were it not that I find precisely the same proportion given in the London tables. Judging however, from my own experience in other country towns, I should still say that the proportion of cases in Penzance was disproportioned to the size of the place, regarded as a country district. I have nothing to advance respecting their nature or history. Only in two years out of the whole seventeen comprehended in the Dispensary tables, are they arranged under distinct heads: they are as follows:—acne rosacea, 2; herpes, 1; lepra vulgaris, 16; impetigo, 3; porrigo, 2; pityriasis rubra, 4; psora. 13; psoriasis, 2; tinea capitis, 17; anomalous, 22; total, 82. They seemed to affect no particular class more than another. Admitting their frequency, we, perhaps, need to look no farther for the causes of this than to the poverty and consequent defective nutriment and clothing of the inhabitants, and to a general want of cleanliness among the lower classes, which is not altogether dependent on poverty. The following remarks on this subject, from the Dispensary Reports, are pertinent:—"The frequent occurrence of one disease (itch) which appears on the list, and which one cause alone can keep alive, gives us occasion to notice the importance of inculcating on our poorer neighbours the benefits of cleanliness. The more than ordinary neglect of this duty among the lower classes of Cornwall is matter of general observation, and the evils it entails on them are obvious. The connexion of cutaneous disease with this cause requires no comment."—Rep. 1827.—"It is gratifying to observe, that since our last meeting