h
biers. My daily observations convinced me that the epidemy was not
caught by approach, unless that approach was accompanied by an
inhaling of the breath, or by touching the infected person; I
therefore had a separation made across the gallery, inside of my
house, between the kitchen and dining parlour, of the width of
three feet, which is sufficiently wide to prevent the inhaling the
178 breath of a person. From this partition or table of separation I
took the dishes, and after dinner returned them to the same place,
suffering none of the servants to come near me; and in the
accounting-house, I had a partition made to prevent the too near
approach of any person who might call on business; and this
precaution I firmly believe to be all that is necessary, added to
that of receiving money through vinegar, and taking care not to
touch or smell infectious substances.

[Footnote 137: A sanctuary a mile south-east of the town of
Mogodor, from whence, the town receives its name.]

Fear had an extraordinary effect in disposing the body to receive
the infection; and those who were subject thereto, invariably
caught the malady, which was for the most part fatal. At the
breaking out of the plague at Mogodor, there were two medical men,
an Italian and a Frenchman, the latter, a man of science, a great
botanist, and of an acute discrimination; they, however, did not
remain, but took the first opportunity of leaving the place for
Teneriffe, so that the few Europeans had no expectation of any
medical assistance except that of the natives. Plaisters of gum
ammoniac, and the juice of the leaves of the _opuntia_, or _kermuse
ensarrah_, _i.e._ prickly pear, were universally applied to the
carbuncles, as well as to the buboes, which quickly brought them to
suppuration: many of the people of property took copious draughts
of coffee and Peruvian bark. The _Vinaigre de quatre voleurs_, was
179 used by many, also camphor, smoking tobacco, or fumigations of gum
Sandrac; straw was also burned by some, who were of opinion, that
any thing which produced abundance of smoke, was sufficient to
purify the air of pestilential effluvia.

During the existence of the plague, I had been in the chambers of
men on their death-bed: I had had Europeans at my table, who were