fter them actually plunged into the cisterns, for they
were tormented by unceasing thirst, which was not in the least
assuaged whether they drank little or much. They could not sleep; a
restlessness which was intolerable never left them.

While the disease was at its height the body, instead of wasting away,
held out amid these sufferings in a marvelous manner, and either they
died on the seventh or ninth day, not of weakness, for their strength
was not exhausted, but of internal fever, which was the end of most;
or, if they survived, then the disease descended into the bowels and
there produced violent ulcerations; severe diarrhea at the same time
set in, and at a later stage caused exhaustion, which finally with few
exceptions carried them off. For the disorder, which had originally
settled in the head, passed gradually through the whole body, and, if
a person got over the worst, would often seize the extremities and
leave its mark, attacking the privy parts and the fingers and the
toes; and some escaped with the loss of these, some with the loss of
their eyes. Some, again, had no sooner recovered than they were seized
with a forgetfulness of all things and knew neither themselves nor
their friends.

The malady took a form not to be described, and the fury with which it
fastened upon each sufferer was too much for human nature to endure.
There was one circumstance in particular which distinguished it from
ordinary diseases. The birds and animals, which feed on human flesh,
altho so many bodies were lying unburied, either never went near them
or died if they touched them. This was proved by a remarkable
disappearance of the birds of prey, which were not to be seen either
about the bodies or anywhere else; while in the case of the dogs the
fact was even more obvious, because they live with man.

Such was the general nature of the disease; I omit many strange
peculiarities which characterized individual cases. None of the
ordinary sicknesses attacked any one while it lasted, or, if they did,
they ended in the plague. Some of the sufferers died from want of
care, others equally who were receiving the greatest attention. No
single remedy could be deemed a specific; for that which did good to
one did harm to another. No constitution was of itself strong enough
to resist or weak enough to escape the attacks; the disease carried
off all alike and defied every mode of treatment. Most appalling was
the despondency which seiz