Book I CONTAGION 69

Furthermore, there are certain foodsö5' whose frequent use
causes this or that sort of infection; some foods produce elephan—
tia, others scabies, others carbuncles, and so on. Sometimes
too the animals that live underground warn us of certain in—
fections, when many of them emerge from their retreats and
their own homes into the open air.

*Qften a tiny mouse shall give thee an augury of ill. No tie
of love can hold it beneath the depths of the earth, but it breaks
forth from its trenches, forgets its life, its habits, and leaves its
tender young and pleasant abode. 'The earth herself shall also
give thee signs, as though she knew what is to come, what time
she quakes and sighs issue from her entrails; the cities are shak—
en, and the whole peak of Athos is fear—stricken, while Nereus
is affnghted beneath the waves.^^5?

In fact, frequent earthquakes do of themselves announce con—
tagions to come, since the exhalation confined in the earth not
only acquires some noxious quality, but is also most liable to
be engendered by those putrefactions that occur beneath the
earth. Again, when you observe many eases of carbuncles, ex—
anthemata and buboes, you may well be alarmed. The pres—
ence of those contagions that come from without is indicated
by a great number of cases of some one disease, though it does
not follow that, when many suffer from the same disease, the
malady is contagious.  Vou can recognize its contagious charac—
ter, both from the kind of disease and the symptoms that re—
sult. And in the same way you can determine whether those
diseases that arise originally in our bodies are contagious or
not, both from the kind of disease and from the symptoms that.
result.

But I have already said enough, in a general way, about the
nature of contagion; hovw it arises; by means of what principles ;;
what are the differentiae of contagions, and their causes; andi
finally what are their common indications.