OF INFECTION.

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eases are in some degree infectious, no one should con-tinue long with the sick, except the necessary atten-dants. I mean not, however, by this caution, to deterthose whose duty or office leads them to wait upon thesick, from such a laudable and necessary employment.

Many things are in the power of the magistrate,which would tend to prevent the spreading of infection;as the promoting of public cleanliness, removing jails,hospitals, burying grounds, and other places where in-fection may be generated, at a proper distance fromgreat towns ;* widening the streets; pulling down use-less walls, and taking all methods to promote a free cir-culation of air through every part of the town, &c.Public hospitals, or proper places of reception for thesick, provided they were kept clean, well ventilated, andplaced in an open situation, would likewise tend to pre-vent the spreading of infection. Such places of recep-tion would preventthe poor, when sick, from being visitedby their idle or officious neighbours. They would like-wise render it unnecessary for sick servants to be keptin their masters' houses. Masters had better pay forhaving their servants taken care of in an hospital, thanrun the hazard of having an infectious disease diffusedamong a numerous family. Sick servants and poorpeople, when placed in hospitals, are not only less apt todiffuse infection among their neighbours, but have like-wise the advantage of being well attended.

We are not, however, to learn that hospitals, insteadof preventing infection, may become the means of dif-fusing it. When they are placed in the middle of greattowns, when numbers of patients are crowded togetherin small apartments, when there is a constant commu-nication kept up between the citizens and the patients,and when cleanliness and ventilation are neglected, theybecome nests for hatching diseases, and every one whogoes into them not only runs a risk of receiving in-fection himself, but likewise of communicating it toothers. This, however, is not the fault of the hospitals,

* The ancients would not suffer even the temples of their gods,Where the sick resorted, to be built within the walls of a city.

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