Page:A Treatise upon the Small-Pox.pdf/48

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Of the several Sorts

Body, till their whole Course is compleated; and in some Cases they are very few, and large, not perhaps more than eighty or a hundred in all, and sometimes not so many; and they of this kindly Sort are generally judged fully ripened by the tenth Day from the first Illness, or the sixth from their first Appearance; the eleventh Day therefore is not justly fixed for the Completion of all of this Kind, as the eighth Day from the first Attack is not truly assigned as their most dangerous Season. By the continuing of this Sort so long, they are distinguished from the Chicken or Swine Pox, which as they are larger, and often full of Water, so they disappear before the eighth Day, though in that Space they sometimes stay long enough to leave Impressions or Prints in the Skin; and by this it may be known, that is, by their Continuance till the tenth Day, whether the Eruptions or Pustules were truly the Small-Pox or no.

But there are yet higher Degrees of the distinct Kind, of which the highest of all produces such a Number of Pustules or little Boils, that when they are ripe and full of Matter, they almost flow together, and become the Flux Kind; and this Sort proves sometimes fatal, by the great Quantity to be cast forth and digested, as well as by the ill Quality of the Matter, approaching too near to Malignancy.

As Nature begins with low and mean Productions, and arises by several Steps and va-

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