It had been raging at Cairo with the greatest
fury for several months; and at Suez a large part of the population had
died:
From that port two ships laden with cotton stuffs had carried it
to Djidda, and from thence it was communicated to Yembo. No instance of
the plague had ever before been witnessed in the Hedjaz, at least none
within the memory of man; and the inhabitants could with difficulty
persuade themselves that such an event had occurred, especially at a
time when the holy cities had been reconquered from the Wahabys. The
intercourse with Egypt had not at any time been greater than now, and it
was, therefore, no wonder that this scourge should be carried to the
Hedjaz. While ten or fifteen people only died per day, the Arabs of the
town could not believe that the disease was the plague, although the
usual appearance of the biles upon the bodies of the infected, and the
rapid progress of the disorder, which seldom lasted more than three or
four days, might have been convincing proofs. In five or six days after
my arrival the mortality increased; forty or fifty persons died in a
day, which, in a population of five or six thousand, was a terrible
mortality. The inhabitants now felt a panic: little disposed to submit
[p.412] as patiently to the danger as the Turks do in every other part
of the East, the greater part of them fled into the open country, and
the town became deserted; but the disease followed the fugitives, who
had encamped close together; and thus finding no remedy to the evil,
many of them returned.
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