Travels in the Mogul Empire (Bernier) 24.8

24.8

I supped with M. de Bermon, our vice-consul at Rosetta, eight or ten days after the fall of the Goute. Three of the party were that same evening seized with the plague, of whom two died on the eighth day; and the other patient, who happened to be M. de Bermon himself, would perhaps have fallen a victim to the disease if I had not ventured to prescribe a remedy, and lanced his abscess. I caught the infection, and but for the butter of antimony, to which I had immediate recourse, it might have been seen in my case also that men die of the plague after the descent of the Goute. The emetic, taken at the commencement of the disorder, performed wonders, and I was not confined to the house more than three or four days. A Bedouin servant attended me; he endeavoured to keep up my spirits by swallowing, without a moment's hesitation, what remained of the soup I was taking; and being a predestinarian, he laughed at the idea of danger from the plague. I am far from denying that this distemper is generally attended with less danger after the fall of the Goute. All I maintain is, that the decrease of danger should not be attributed to the Goute. In my opinion the mitigation of the disease is owing to the heat of the weather, then become intense, which opens the pores and expels the pestiferous and malignant humours that remained confined in the body.