Francis Cornelius Webb

“ Business was at an end; citizens fled to the country; peasants thronged the towns; many sought an asylum in foreign lands. The shrieks of women, rushing half naked from their habitations, mingled with the groans of the dying, and the deep clang of the funeral bell, booming through the misty air from every tower and steeple, deafened the ear, and struck terror to the heart of the passer. The epidemic was at its height in the capital from the 9th to the 19th of July, and it lingered until the 30th. In this time, at the lowest computation, nearly a thousand people perished. ”

“ Even as late as the days of the great rebellion, occasional references may be found to it in popular sermons and treatises; whereas we might have supposed its memory would have been effaced by the frequent outbreaks of plague which had intervened. The sweating sickness has come down to us as the remarkable epidemic of a remarkable age. In an era distinguished by the emancipation of thought, by the spread of letters, by the splendours of a social and religious reformation, death appeared in a new garb, and in unwonted tones asserted his dominion. ”